The Only One
by The Cat's Whiskers
Summary: My resolution to the whole Weir exit/Weir-Sheppard thing...sorry, I lack my usual elegance of summation. See also Author's Note
1. Chapter 1

Atlantis

**Disclaimer:** The usual

SPOILER: This is set in and post "Season 5", and contains stuff that may be happening in that show with regard to cast, plots, etc.

**Summary: **My resolution to the whole Sheppard-Weir thing. See also Author's Note

**Rating:** fruity language and some _in flagrante delicto_

For Greywolf Lupous, whose _Revenge of the Discs_ made me laugh, despite nearly killing me (see below) from oxygen deprivation.

**Note:** This rabid plot bunny appeared at 3am and wouldn't die; considering I currently have bronchitis, laryngitis, tonsillitis, an ear infection, and fever and typed this thing one paragraph per hour on a laptop because I can't get out of bed…I've never written SGA until now because as an author your characters have to really be 'alive' to you inside your own head, not 2-dimensionally on screen.

So why 5 seasons in and at 3am when I've a temperature of 102°?…Actually, guess that answers _that_ question. Anyhow, since the Atlantis gang have taken up residence in my imagination with the SGC, the Winchester Brothers, The Magnificent 7 and the Sentinel of Cascade…they have apparently decided that I need to play catch up in the SGA 'oeuvre'…

Chapter 1

"Great work here, John!" Sheppard snarled at himself as he kept under the tree canopy cover.

His hand fluttered up towards his earpiece, but he thought better of it – trying to contact Rodney, Ronan or Teyla would probably work, but was too great a risk of betraying his own position.

"This is just perfect," he growled in self-irritation. Acting as bait to lure the bad guys away - like that Earth bird that pretended it had a broken wing for foxes – whilst his team-mates evac'd everyone…

It had been a cunning plan to save everyone's asses, but as Ronan had earlier pointed out, you were only allowed to _call_ it that if it actually _worked_, and on that point John was having some…technical difficulties. For a start, getting boxed in and cut off from your only escape route - a.k.a. the Stargate - definitely lost you points under the _cunning _column.

_But it would've worked_…John ignored the faint voice that told him being mulishly stubborn about his magnum opus when there was only _himself_ around to convince was, come on, a bit ridiculous, as he risked ducking out from under the foliage canopy to scan the skies again.

This was MR-something-or-other; MENSA-eligible IQ regardless, John had better things to clutter up his brain cells with than binary-code stellar cartography designations only Samantha Carter or Rodney understood anyway. Football scores, for one, and why it beat-out _ice hockey_ as a sport to irk anyone Canadian…oh, and remembering to call it '_stellar cartography_' in the first place – the boffins felt that was way too _Star Trek_ fanboyish…until you started calling it 'space maps' instead (which was what Stellar Cartography actually meant, come on!) which made them really _sulk_. Ah, geek baiting – hours of fun for all the family…

MERwhatever had a human population who called themselves the Pathrusim, who, yes, had 'Ancestors' that had placed them on the planet aeons ago – or dumped them and done a runner, as Rodney had put it. McKay's acerbic opinion of the Ancients had finally degenerated to the levels of acid only found in Dr Daniel Jackson's opining of the race. John had to admit they had a point. Five years and a new planet into the SGA Expedition, the more you learned about the Ancients, the less likeable in _any _respect they seemed to be. And it had been Rodney (and Radek Zelenka) who had both spotted what even Jackson had missed, for all his Ascended/De-ascended-plus-Prior status (and what was with _that_?), in that the Ori (who were Ancients) and the Wraith both fed on humans in the same way – both gruesomely sucked out your life force, the Wraith for food, the Ori for power.

Which apparently had some big '_awoooga!_' implications for genetic research into humanising the Wraith according to Carson Beckett – this Carson, the clone that was - as it meant previous attempts like Michael – which had been done by the real Carson, the dead Carson – could have been operating on an incorrect premise. '_No kidding Carson! Yah think!_' Rodney had erupted at that one when Carson (new Carson) had explained this during a very tense staff briefing with Atlantis' new administrator Richard Woolsey (_oh the joy_) and Colonel Caldwell (_oh even more the joy_).

Ignoring the patented McKay sarcasm, Carson had told them it was like designing an environmentally-friendly combustion engine that used water in place of oil – good as far as it went, but what you _really_ wanted to achieve was do away with the larger problem of the gasoline. Basically, if the Ancients, rather than the Iratus bug, had contributed the Wraiths' distinctly non-charming life-force-sucking genes then eradicating the insectoid DNA would in fact do the opposite of solving the problem of eradicating the Wraiths need – and ability – to feed on human life-energy. In theory it could give rise to a situation where a Wraith could look _entirely human_ and sneak off to Earth for a scrumptious all-you-can-eat buffet of 6 billion courses – and then invite family and friends.

Colonel Caldwell had looked particularly dyspeptic at that, understandably so since a Goa'uld, as part of an attempt to destroy Atlantis, had enslaved him in his own body for several weeks. John and Steven Caldwell were never going to be all Kum-Bi-Yah round the campfire, but the two had thawed slightly towards each other over the incident.

Caldwell had been having some major guilt issues over his actions, and John had admitted to the perpetually grim Colonel that when Beckett's retrovirus begun to transform him into a giant Iratus Bug, he had retained his mental 'humanity' for longer than he had let be known despite his rapid physical transformation into 'the bug man'. He had been unable to stop himself doing things like attacking Elizabeth or his team-mates, but had been more aware of what he was doing than his rapidly mutating physical appearance had led them to believe, a fact of which _'I'll always be ashamed, I guess…at the risk of insubordination Colonel, what I'm trying to say is I think we're both just gonna have to live with this stuff…'_

Like so many of the human colonies abandoned by the Ancients when they fled the Wraith, the Pathrusim now numbered only 1500 people and were low-tech agriculturalists after centuries of repeated 50-year losses to Wraith attacks. However, the Pathrusim had long ago realised that 'low-tech' could also mean 'things invisible to bad guy technology', which they had demonstrated with pride to the Atlantean First Contact Team who had come through the Stargate – Major Evan Lorne, Dr Radek Zelenka, Dr Jennifer Keller, Sergeant Iain Markham and Corporal Emrys Cadwalladar in that instance.

Pathrus (what they called the planet logically if unoriginally) had a native predator, a six-legged spider-bug. It was clearly related in some way to the Iratus bug, though John had made sure to steer well clear after Carson (clone Carson not dead Carson) had given him a _way_ too-detailed explanation of how he was probably 'sensitised' to the bug's venom in the same way as someone might be to wasp stings or peanuts after the first, apparently innocuous, exposure.

After being bitten initially, and 'saved' by Teyla, Ford and Rodney in the puddle-jumper – ironically by electrocuting him with a defibrillator – his body would have gone to 'high alert' against the insect. That had probably accounted for his rapid transformation when Ellia's bite caused Beckett's first retrovirus to infect him, a sort of Pegasus Galaxy variation on anaphylactic shock…'_so, third time of one managing to sink its fangs into me would definitely not turn out to be a charm, I get it Carson…please, I get it._' For all the cautious détente between them, John could quite happily spend the rest of his life _not_ looking like "Todd"-the-Wraith's louche brother.

The spider-bug thing fed on the large Pathrus avian species (similar to a heron) and its M.O. was to scuttle up the trunks of the extremely tall trees (similar to Eucalypts, often 70-100 feet tall) and spin a web between. Impressive didn't cover it - the 'web' had the stopping power of Atlantis's defence shields and, by virtue of the molecular structure, was invisible until you hit it – hence what Dr Zelenka had explained to them after his first visit as the extraordinary – and creepy - sight of huge – but clearly dead – birds apparently levitating high in the air suspended by nothing.

It had also turned out in the distant past that the webs were completely undetectable by Wraith Darts as well. Travelling too fast and at just the right – or wrong – height as they swooped down, the Darts either exploded on impact, or depending on the angle of impact, the web acted as a trampoline and the Darts were flirted backwards into the path of those behind. One nonagenarian Pathrusim claimed in the last attempted cull he'd seen one Dart flirted back half a mile and annihilate seven others in its death dive.

Pathrusim was definitely a galactic backwater; only smaller Hive ships with junior queens or male Wraith attempting to make a name for themselves to achieve status or attract a senior queen had ever come to the planet. Since the Pathrusim hidden deep in underground caverns were undetectable to the scanners and no energy signatures were apparent it seemed to the Hive ship that the Darts had simply blown up of their own accord. Rather than destroy the planet using precious ordnance the Hive ship might need against the Asuran Replicators or a more aggressive Wraith vessel, originally the Hive ships had simply left the planet for the next culling.

That had given the Pathrusim breathing room. Centuries earlier they had managed to collect enough Dart fragments to study and develop. That had enabled them to implement phase two of their _one-two whammy_ as John privately thought of it. The Wraith Darts scanned for biological life – something moving, something humanoid shaped, something with warm blood, etc. That was why they didn't take the 'bait' of bomb-droids sent trundling out. However, the Pathrusim had built crude humanoid 'runner' robots and jury-rigged a Dart-based navigation system to warn of an approaching Hive ship.

When the Hive ship entered orbit, the robots were wired to blow up, then one of the local livestock was freshly slaughtered and its outer carcass draped around the runner, which were sent out into the open. From a fast-moving Dart, the stumbling erratic gait looked like a human fleeing in an extremity of terror; the shape was human, the sensors detected warm blood and organic tissue indicating a biological entity, and the robot was beamed aboard the Dart. The bombs were designed to detonate one second after the re-materialisation process, and according to the epic poem 'Haathru of the Pathrusim' (which John had managed to avoid sitting through), no less than three Hive ships had been obliterated in such a manner, their detritus being gathered into the orbit cloud of a nearby asteroid belt and thus leaving no clues for other Wraith ships.

It was pretty close to genius, and the Pathrusim were justifiably rather impressed with themselves. Unfortunately, it turned out they had a serious problem – the spider-bugs. John and Rodney and Kithu, one of the Pathrusim's best and brightest 'Bardaleers' (historians, to other people) had gone out in a puddle jumper to do a fly over of Pathrus to check there was no Ancient technology just lurking around.

They'd learned _that_ lesson after the whole Lord Protector debacle when it turned out that another 'starship city' was buried underground on a planet. Rodney had gone a peculiar shade of purple when it had finally impinged on him (and, truth be told, everyone else) what it actually _meant _in that 'Atlantis' had been built as a _spaceship _not a _city_. It was Colonel Steven Caldwell who had made the intuitive leap to realising that, such being the case, 'Atlantis' could very well have not been the city's _name _but the designation given to an entire _class _of ships. Like the Asgaard's _O'Neill Class _and _Valhalla Class _warships like _The Daniel Jackson _and _The Samantha Carter_ – or the U.S. Navy's four 'classes' of ship, the Kitty Hawk, Enterprise, Nimitz and Gerald Ford.

In short, it was entirely possible that several identical or near-as-damn-it versions of _Atlantis _were dotted around the Pegasus Galaxy (and several others?) like discarded candy wrappers that anyone could just 'pick up and play with' after uttering the most terrifying words in any language: I WONDER WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF I JUST…_And didn't that prospect just fill a man with joy…_John had come to increasingly understand and respect General O'Neill's intense dislike of crystal-based technology. Sure, it was dirt-cheap and non-polluting, but when you forgot to turn it off, it would last on 'standby' for thousands – millions – of years until someone accidentally tripped over it…_and wackiness ensued_.

However, the flyover showed no Ancient technology apparent. What _had_ got Kithu squawking was the southern continent – to the extent of major invasion of personal space by leaning right across John as if trying to shove his face through the jumper's front screen – '_hello, need to see where I'm going!_' John had barked at him even as Rodney had employed the far more immediate solution of yanking Kithu back down into his seat with the full force of an aerophobic who wants his pilot to have 360° vision available to him _at all times_.

Admittedly, it had only taken a naked-eye glance to see that something was seriously wrong.

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued… 


	2. Chapter 2

Atlantis Chapter 2

Pathrus was Earthlike in that of its two main continents (plus a couple of archipelagos), the southern one was slightly balmier and more sub-tropic. However, it also possessed an active volcano range, which the cooler Northern one did not. But Kithu was adamant that the southern continent was a lush cornucopia of flora and fauna, a fecund abundance of flowers, fruits, plants and animals.

'_In which case, where are they all?_' was the unspoken question Rodney and John had exchanged with a glance at each other as John had brought the puddle-jumper warily into a lower altitude and taken another 'pass'. The entire landmass, as far as the puddle-jumper's passengers could see or its sensors detect, was a desert wasteland. No animals, no vegetation…

The entire landmass apparently had some sort of dirty off-white crust that John had flatly refused to land the puddle-jumper upon in view of the sound fact they had no idea whether the 'crust' was one mile or one millimetre deep and the puddle-jumper's sensors weren't calibrated that fine. But Rodney had appeased Kithu by sending out a small drone to get a sample of the stuff. Later analysis by Rodney and Radek back in Atlantis had shown that the white crust were actually skeletons – billions upon billions of them – of spider-bugs and their chitinous shells. Parrish, the botanist, had been hauled in and after much to-and-fro from xeno-biology to botany to geology to climatology and back again, Radek Zelenka had formulated a hypothesis.

The summary of the Czech's theory was that the problem was the spider-bugs. Unaware of the quite literally evolving Wraith threat, the ancient Pathrusim had expanded numerically and technologically across both continents. In the South, they had inadvertently removed the large avian that was the spider-bugs' main prey but also counter-predator. The lack of foliage cover on the 'eucalypt trees' trunks meant the bugs were vulnerable as they scuttled up and span the webs and many were picked off and eaten by the avian species – according to Parrish, anyway. This wasn't a problem, as the humans controlled the bug population, until the initial Wraith attacks decimated the Pathrusim population and sent their development tumbling back a millennium, completing denuding the southern continent of people in the process.

On the southern landmass the bug population had '_gone Australian_' according to Rodney…'_You know, like the rabbits…in Oz…an idiot named Thomas Austin let 24 out of a sack in the Outback in 1859 and 20 years later there's 300 million of them hopping around a continent where they have no natural predators because 50 million years of isolation from every other landmass means nothing from snakes through dingoes to even Saltwater Crocs recognises Brer Rabbit as a tasty morsel?_' He'd rolled his eyes at the blank faces, '_Come on people!_'

Zelenka had stepped in at that point and confirmed that Rodney's analogy was correct. The bug population had gone critical then cannibalistic. Without the avian species the bugs had attacked and devoured every other living thing they could find, and then started on each other – since bug bodies rotting didn't do soil quality a lot of good, the more bugs starved or were eaten the more the ground was contaminated, the less plants grew and _bingo!_, one desert, to go. The only reason the northern continent had been safe was that the bugs drowned in water and there was far too large a gap between the two landmasses for even the most tenacious bug to make it.

Unfortunately another precautionary flyover had showed isolated areas of the northern continent were presently showing similar signs – dying vegetation, and a suspicious absence of _all_ usual bird and animal species in a vicinity. Pathrus didn't have the large global human population it should have, or the technology to spare locating spider-bug nests since scientists had customarily focussed all efforts on anti-Wraith measures.

In order to save their world they needed to exterminate or at least severely eradicate the majority of the spider-bugs back to a remnant population. But they needed a greater level of spider-bugs to obtain the webs that crashed the Darts – a synthetic version of anything close was decades of dedicated research away, and would have to join the colossal list of what Colonel Samantha Carter had wryly described as, "'cool/mega-important stuff the Atlantis expedition just found that we need improving, fixing and/or back-engineering by a week last Tuesday'".

After a lot of hot air, most of which, surprisingly, didn't come from him, Atlantis's latest administrator Dr Richard Woolsey had given the go for this mission (_and never mentioned 'cost' once, maybe there's hope for Woolly-Head yet_). Specifically, they were to relocate the Pathrusim population _en masse_ to another planet, then send in Marine and Air Force-crewed puddle-jumper units to detect and annihilate all but a remnant of the spider-bug species. Then simmer for twenty years and serve – hopefully the planet's natural ecological checks and balances would swing into operation if given a helping hand and the Pathrusim could move back. By that time the Wraith would have been defeated or at least stopped – John knew _that_ because the alternative was unthinkable…and one _he_ would certainly never live to see.

_And it was going so well…_A full four-fifths of the Pathrusim had been relocated in an orderly, even jocular 'camping trip vacation' manner. Until the Pathrus early warning system detected one approaching Hive ship, though it was too crude to ascertain the vessel's size - the Pathrusim had never realised that, as with humans, to the Wraith size mattered – bigger ship more prestigious/powerful Wraith in charge. All the Pathrusim scientists and roboticists had been relocated and there was no time to get them back and implement their SOP robot-bomb subterfuge. All the Atlanteans could do was pick up the pace and hold the 'Gate until the last groups of Pathrusim went through.

They were even giving the Wraith pause for thought – until the Hive ship abruptly turned tail and ran…in the face of another Asuran Replicator one which merrily started blasting at everything in sight. Despite the gravity of the situation, a part of John would have much preferred to stick to Bad Guys One instead of the new and improved version.

Up to a point, John had always been able to sympathise with the Asurans. If_ he_ had been a replicator, pleading with his creators for help – only to be contemptuously treated like nothing more than a broken toaster and savagely attacked – his anger management problem would have been off the charts too. And ,yes, he got the replicators' sibling-rivalry angle too. Finding out that your creators had 'children' - those silly, squishy 'hyuhmans' who were less intelligent, less robust, less long-lived and less powerful – but which they _still_ favoured over _your_ best efforts, would tend to bring out that whole 'red-headed stepchild' inferiority complex. John could definitely relate – John had been both brainier and more athletic than David (_okay, only a bit more_) but Dave had always been Dad's favourite, not because of complementary personalities or common interests, but because Dave had always just fallen in line with Dad's attempts to micromanage their lives and live his own through them again, whereas John hadn't permitted the parental bullying.

So, _once_, John had understood the Asurans' Equal Opps hatred – the Wraith, for being so vicious the Ancients had deliberately created _them_ as a species of homicidal maniacs even worse in the galaxy's most stupid example of one-upmanship; the humans, for being the inferior but always favoured 'children' and the Ancients for not just abandoning their creation but trying to pull off genocide in the bargain.

Meaning that once again humanity was left to clear up the Ancients' mess. A while back John had caught a video-link broadcasting part of a speech Daniel Jackson was giving back on Earth to some Pentagon bigwigs and the IOA Committee chiefs, and the good Doc had excoriated the Ancients with such rhetoric that John had been glad he was stationed _this _side of the universe. But Jackson had had several good points. As far as John could see, their attitude to any mistake they made or anything that went wrong was to (a) run away (the Ori, the Wraith, fleeing their own galaxy of Celestis for the Milky Way, then Pegasus back to Earth), (b) ignore it and hope it would go away (the Goa'uld, the 'resurrection box' discovered in South America, the Duronda weapon) or (c) try and get rid of it – the Asurans, Atlantis itself, etc.

As Dr Jackson had said, '_what I cannot and will not forgive is not only the arrant cowardice displayed by these creatures, and their steadfast refusal to take responsibility for and corrective action about their mistakes, but above all their repeated, wilful and shameful interference with and persecution – perhaps even murder of, for all I know - those few of their species who had the moral courage and honour to try and atone for the Ancients' intransigent arrogance, repeated abandonment and callous disregard for those they left in the lurch. Oma Desala, Orlin, Chaya Sar, Janus, Merlin, Morgan le Fay…are names that I hope makes every single one of those conceited glowing squid writhe with shame.'_

Galaxy away or not, John had been prepared to dive for cover at the first sizzle of a enraged lightening bolt,but it hadn't happened – though maybe that wasn't so surprising as it would have proven Jackson had struck a nerve. As a former Ascended being, though, and a guy who'd been turned into a Prior against his will – what was that scuttlebutt joke, oh yeah…Jackson had been _prior-itised_. Still, Jackson had the moral high ground; even Vala Mal Doran, a woman whose moral compass, according to Cam Mitchell, wasn't just broken but smashed into a million itty-bitty pieces and scattered to the four winds to boot, had considered the Ancients to be morally reprehensible – apparently her '_I can see why you came back, Daniel_' had mortally insulted entire swathes of Ascended-blockheads (who _did _look like nothing so much as giant glowing squid, come to think of it) who considered themselves vastly above the 'moral mores' of the lower planes.

But! But, if the Ancients had dealt with the Ori instead of running away…if they'd nipped the Goa'uld in the bud and sorted out the Wraith before the initial hybrid creatures evolved into their current state of sentience and technology…there would have been no _need _for the Asurans - although Rodney had confessed that '_someone of my genius should have seen it coming_. _The fact that there was a Replicator disintegration weapon the Asgard knew nothing about in the Ancients' arsenal millennia before that robot-kid Whatshername was created and independently invented the Milky Way version, automatically gives rise to the question as to why the Ancients needed one for a threat that wouldn't be created until several thousand years after they'd schlepped to Pegasus.'_

But no, the Ancients had done nothing but play the 'higher being' card and leave the universe littered with death-traps like the Dakara super-weapon that half the time they'd just left on standby like a VCR for any twit to trip over and activate and annihilate half the known universe. As General O'Neill – a man who John Sheppard listened to – had put it, the Ancients never seemed to grasp the fact that they had never been as smart as they'd always thought they were.

Colonel Carter had also apparently never agreed with the Asgard's claim that humans were too devolved to be able to cope with the 'place of our legacy' downloads; it was a problem of scale, not substance. If there been some way of General O'Neill accessing only those portions of data he needed to, rather than having to go the all or nothing route, there never would have been a problem – it was the difference between giving a starving man a cup of weak tea for his first sustenance or force-feeding him a banquet.

Likewise, if you ignored Rodney, Zelenka, Beckett and the other IQ-high fliers, the average 'man-in-the-street' plucked at random, dropped in the gate-room and told to go for it, could have made several parts of Atlantis functional enough to support life again given sufficient time, and even without possessing the ATA gene – Radek for instance had little trouble, even though the gene therapy hadn't worked; and if humans were so innately dumb, how come Rodney had had to have the gene therapy whereas John hadn't – meaning the giant glowing squid couldn't claim Rodney's IQ was a throwback to some Ancient progenitor going native with the locals – Rodney's genius was pure _homo sapiens_. (Although, that could _also_ account for his having the emotional stability of a blancmange in an earthquake).

The operative word here, though, was '_once_'. He would never ever forget his last glimpse of Elizabeth's face before they fled the Asurans; he had woken up in cold sweat night after night, hating himself for his failure – "'to do _what?_ _Be superman?_'" Ronan had asked him once, softly, after a shrewd look at the limp hair and the pasty face. Oh yes, Ronan might be an overachiever in the size department and his tendency to be _cheerfully _homicidal was always disconcerting, but behind the bloodthirsty grin was a keen brain that observed details others missed – and then was smart enough to keep quiet about it; playing big and stupid had gotten Ronan out of more trouble than all the fancy fighting skills in the galaxy. Ronan's entire world had gone down fighting, but they'd still fallen to the Wraith.

There had been nothing John could have done, except die with Elizabeth and his responsibility at the time was – as she would have furiously insisted upon – to the entire Atlantis expedition.

Except she wasn't dead…

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued… 


	3. Chapter 3

Atlantis Chapter 3

Despite his current predicament, John could still remember the overwhelming _joy_…the scuttlebutt had gone round Atlantis in five seconds flat when the rumours started that Dr Elizabeth Weir had been found, critically injured but alive, in the mangled wreckage of a fire-fight between a Hive and Asuran ship that ended in mutual obliteration.

The giddy euphoria John had experienced had gone way beyond a teammate's relief, or respect for an admired superior or even the delight of a personal friendship…and he'd known it. Both of them always had; there was always that _frisson_, the way she used to say 'John' that never failed to send small electric prickles down his spine and make his stomach fizz. It was why they'd both always been careful to maintain that distance, that separation – '_always walk three feet from the cliff-edge and there's always a chance you'll fall off_, as John's granddad had cautioned, '_always walk twenty feet away and no matter how many times you stumble, you'll never end up broken and bleeding at rock-bottom._'

Wise advice, from a wise man; John had known from the start that vested interests would never allow Elizabeth to return to Atlantis, even had it been possible to completely eradicate the Asuran Replicator nanites from her body, which it wasn't. 'Compromised', 'security threat', were stock phrases poised to-be-inserted into reports. But Elizabeth herself had pre-empted everyone; sending a universal message of thanks and encouragement to the expedition, and firmly vetoing any return to the city, admitting that while fit enough 'to perfect bureaucracy' she would never be healthy enough again to retake charge of the expedition.

It was a universal truth – being the commander of the Atlantis Expedition, and civilian or not, that's what Elizabeth had been – made demands of time and energy that would challenge the fittest and most robust of people. In terms of physical ability, Elizabeth returning would make her a liability as everyone tried to shoulder yet more burdens for her and ease the strain, and quite frankly that wasn't possible. John's own paperwork was always about 18-months' behind (as increasingly snippy emails Richard Woolsey, then General Landry and General O'Neill testified), and wasn't he always having to threaten Rodney, Radek and every-other-boffin-he-saw with a fate worse than the last one if they _didn't_ stop spending 25/8 in a lab somewhere living on coffee and sugar? Rodney himself had once sniped that '_I don't sleep, I just go on Standby for a couple of hours a week_'. John had overheard one of Major Lorne's men dryly comment that he was glad he was dumb 'cause that meant he could stop working eventually in the day.

John's hand drifted to his ear…he was going to have to gamble on it and call Rodney; there had already been too long a delay. His genius notion of leading off the Asurans and then circling back to the Stargate had gone spectacularly well except for the circling bit which instead had sort of turned into this boxed-in-a-valley shape…

All the Pathrusim should have gotten clear and Rodney would be going into nuclear meltdown - which wasn't quite as amusing when you weren't there to _watch_ it, and not so advisable either, apparently. Hadn't some doctor written a paper on Rodney when he was kid…about his too-fast heart? Carson (both dead and clone) Beckett was always twittering on to Rodney about his restricting his caffeine intake and maintaining his gym sessions, both of Rodney customarily ignored until John made him toe the line.

According to Carson, most people's bodies ticked over in neutral, but Rodney's heart was stuck in high-rev…but it _was _funny…one time Rodney and Radek had been having a full-on scream-dinger in the lab that you could hear three towers away; when John arrived, Evan Lorne (the coward) was remaining stoically immobile a healthy distance away. Everyone else was just sidling past and wincing – or placing bets on when McKay's head would actually explode. As it happened, Radek had stopped in mid-rant (Czech anyway, so nobody knew what he was actually _saying_ – though John was sure that '_blbec_' and '_hloupý_' meant idiot), folded his arms and stared at Rodney for a long moment, then commented it was a great pity – if only they could hook up Rodney to Atlantis they'd never need a ZPM again…Game, Set, Match – Zelenka.

Whatever, Rodney would now be bouncing like a kangaroo on an acid trip, or even in orbit depending on how much coffee he'd managed to sneakily sink in place of the actual 'food breakfast' he always insisted to Carson and John that he'd had. After five years and the man still tried to look John straight in the eye and lie about his caffeine addiction.

Movement…a good sixty yards or more, but suspiciously…_scuttling_. Great, it was definitely time to blow this pop-stand; his demise was not going to be a _three strikes and you're out _courtesy of some insect. Still, his thoughts returned briefly to Elizabeth. He wouldn't have been here in this mess at all, if he'd followed his first instincts when he read Elizabeth's Farewell message to Atlantis – and resigned his commission.

_And do what, genius?_ His irksome Id had interrogated him on the heels of That Idea. But that was the point; prior to learning of the Stargates, Elizabeth had been a UN diplomatic negotiator, her career was about sitting in tackily opulent conference rooms, tolerating bad coffee and ego-massaging a succession of self-important windbags. The UN had no idea where she'd been for five years but they'd welcomed Dr Weir back with open arms and the ubiquitous 'attractive salary package'. John came from a military family – both sides – who'd customarily entered their chosen branch of the armed services straight from college – and given the ancestral family cash often they'd just gone straight to OCS – Officer Candidate School – before then.

Other than looking great in uniform and shooting at things, John's civilian repertoire was limited; he'd avoided any contact with the family business interests because if he had 'engaged', instead of respecting the boundaries Dad would've been immediately pressurising him and wearing him down to jettison the Air Force and join the Board of Directors after the first week. What would he have done? Lived on a social security check in DC and just popped around to Elizabeth's when she got home from work on the off chance she might throw him a bone and get laid with the loser? The last time he'd followed his heart, he'd come within a whisker of being court-martialled and in Leavenworth for that whole black-market thing in Afghanistan, and the time before _that_ it had been his impulsive and ultimately disastrous marriage to Nancy.

And he'd shot his own next idea down in flames too – John winced as he realised in his current circumstances that was _not _a good visual place to go. But…he'd actually half-decided to request a transfer Earthside, until he'd realised it would never work. It wouldn't take Rodney's IQ to work out why he wanted it, and a whole host of busybodies and malicious types in the military, NID and IOA would move heaven and earth to ensure he _never _got stationed anywhere near Elizabeth Weir's location.

Even though as a re-civilian she was no longer part of his chain of command, there would be a lot of spiteful, mealy-mouthed reports and lectures about 'good order' and 'setting an example'. Bitterly ironic, considering that the U.S. Military's hard line stance on 'non-fraternisation' was one of the few Rules & Regs he'd always wholeheartedly agreed with, both personally and professionally. No matter how mutual the attraction, or consensual the relationship, it was an abuse of power – during and after the relationship finished, if it did, the junior-ranking partner had no defence against anything the higher-ranked one chose to demand. Even if the relationship ended, and ended amicably not acrimoniously, there would still be a tension, an underlying stress that was bad for everyone. Although Elizabeth was a civilian, she had been the leader of the SGA – she'd been responsible for John's promotion to Lt Colonel and military commander of Atlantis after Colonel Sumner's murder by the Wraith – and hence his superior; if they'd had an affair, and it had soured, he would have been at Elizabeth's mercy, and _not_ in the way he fantasised about being…

But he was answerable to a higher power, too…the Greater Good. The commander of any unit had the final responsibility for the safety and security of those he or she led. Those people in turn had to have complete trust and total faith in their commander's judgement and that he or she would always strive to protect them. Logistically, of course, you could never save everyone, and losing someone under your command was one of the hardest things to bear for any decent officer. But your people would not have that faith or trust in either your judgement or your regard for their well being if you were hot 'n' heavy with one of them.

It wasn't malice, but human nature – if your building had an earthquake or tornado strike, your first thought wasn't Fred, your colleague of 20 years in the next office/cubicle, but on getting to the person or people you loved the most, be that child, parent, partner, sibling or friend. John got that; the guilt at having to leave Elizabeth behind had been bad enough when all his conscience-prodded imagination had had available to torment him was wishful thinking – god alone knew what kind of basket-case he would have been had he and Elizabeth actually been lovers, because deep down John doubted very much he would have been able to leave her.

A unit was fatally compromised the instant those serving in it began evading or second-guessing orders because they couldn't be sure their CO wasn't willingly endangering or even sacrificing their lives in order to ensure the one he or she loved the most made it out no matter what the cost. It was a big part of the reason Teyla was having so many issues with remaining in Atlantis, never mind rejoining their offworld missions; her baby son – weird hybrid or not, bizarre-immaculate-conception deal admittedly – was her priority, and that was as it should be. After all, John and Ronan were both putty in the gurgling infant's podgy hands, how much more so did Teyla love him? Teyla was an object lesson in why having intense emotional attachments across your personal and professional lives was never going to work.

So here he was, stuck in an alien forest, probably crawling with hungry spider-bugs, being shot at by Wraith and Asurans within the same half-hour, because he'd had too much common sense than to ignore the military code and fling himself across Elizabeth's desk panting, '_take me now!_' and too smart not to realise that leaving the Air Force was a waste of time, whilst transferring would have just been clueing in the expedition's enemies and giving them ammunition to interfere in matters that were none of their business and make life miserable for everyone.

He didn't really know Cam Mitchell, SG-1's new CO that well; they'd served, briefly, together in Iraq but Mitchell had already been a Major to John's Captain and well…arrest for black-marketing in Afghanistan…Mitchell had been in another league and sphere at the time. But John had figured out that part of the reason _why_ Daniel Jackson and Teal'c got on so well with Mitchell was a feeling of relief -because, though he'd grown up literally with Colonel Sam Carter as the boy-next-door, their relationship was very much one of sibling affection not romantic interest.

John had never been slow on the uptake and even after only a brief experience of seeing them together he had clued-in to that underlying spark between Jack O'Neill and Samantha Carter - it had been well-hidden, but clearly had been slow-burning for a long time. But again, they had been him and Elizabeth with gender-reverse, so maybe he was already predisposed to pick up the signs? However, neither Jackson nor Teal'c were stupid or unperceptive; both had to have been aware of the situation and the danger posed to SG-1 as a unit and in terms of their ability to protect Earth from the latest Evil Crazy Dude if someone further up the food chain had twigged and jumped in with both feet to make a complete mess of things. Pentagon generals and DC politicians weren't noted for their tact, subtlety – or ability to get it right half the time. If that guy…what had his name been…Kinsey, Senator Kinsey…if he'd found out and been able to split up SG-1 by court-martialling O'Neill or transferring Carter to a non-SGC station then again John wouldn't be here now because he'd either have been killed fighting the Goa'uld or living on an Earth enslaved to the snakeheads. And that was just one example.

So in a way he should be grateful Elizabeth couldn't return. As long as she'd been leader of Atlantis John knew he'd always been walking three feet from the edge, always fighting the temptation…unspoken between them always the knowledge that while John wouldn't _instigate_ he would _reciprocate_ if Elizabeth chose to pursue it, much as he'd ostentatiously flirted with Teyla – at least before Ronan had come into their lives…like you couldn't see the heat there. Fortunately Elizabeth had been just as sensible and aware of her greater responsibilities to everyone in Atlantis over her own wants to cave in to selfish whims.

In contrast, Colonel Carter had evoked in him liking and respect, but his hormones hadn't been saluting her…and they sure as hell wouldn't be for that weasel Woolsey…although, that _wasn't_ fair – give the man credit he hadn't made any 'I'm a bean-counter out of my depth' disastrous decisions lately, and he did seem inclined to listen when John, Rodney and even Major Lorne and Colonel Caldwell, told him in polite politic-speak 'you are being stupid'.

Speaking of Woolsey, if John didn't want their very own 'bald eagle' doing something rash it was time to stop procrastinating and pouting over the fact that Elizabeth wasn't coming back and get back to the Stargate, sharpish!

"_Rodney_…Rodney this is Sheppard…do you read?"

Silence…

Scuttling…closer? _Just try it bug…_

"Rodney! Ronan? Will someone _please _pick up the phone here?!"

Sil-

"_Sh'p'rd!!_" Rodney's voice was strident, as always hitting a couple of octaves higher when he was extremely stressed. "_Where the hell are you!!_"

_Oops_. Despite the situation, John winced. He tended to call the unstable genius "Rodney", "McKay" or "Doctor" depending on whether they were snarking, fighting or mutually homicidal. Rodney, on the other hand, had always consistently stuck to "Sheppard" or "Colonel" if feeling especially savage and most people had followed the scientist's tendency to the extent that only Teyla (and formerly Elizabeth) called him John with any regularity – Ronan usually saved his first name for when he was making some subtle but important point.

John had finally worked out that this was because of the greater scope for "intonational implication". Unlike "John", Rodney could manage Shep_herd_, which meant, 'you are trying to herd people much smarter than you like sheep, stop it and go away'. Then there was Shep_hard_, which was McKay for 'you are coming off like a drill sergeant with toothache, and since I'm not your subordinate you jackbooted military goon, I am going to carry on yelling at you' and then there was Shep_hurd_ which, yes, was intended to rhyme with t-u-r-d in Rodneyspeak.

Then there were the variations like _Sharepurd _which was Rodney whining when John pulled an intervention and cut off his caffeine supply until Rodney (a) ate food; _Share-huh-purrd _was the next level of whinging when John added condition (a) to condition (b) which was to get back in the gym maintaining the required fitness to go on Gate missions 'or else' and – to John – the actively musical _Sheheerpud!_ anguish when he added (a) and (b) to (c) – Rodney was to stay out of his lab for a minimum of two hours and do something else, i.e., "relaxing".

But this was bad – the complete lack of vowels in the strident bark of his name was even worse than those occasions when Rodney pushed out "Colonel" past gritted teeth in a manner that clearly indicated he would much rather be burying those teeth in John's throat and ripping from side to side.

Possibility (a) - Rodney had worked himself into such a rage that when John got back to Atlantis, the scientist would stand there and scream at him for an hour, solid, without pausing for breath or repeating any swear-words (though last time he'd resorted to Czech at the end, which didn't count in John's opinion) and then John would have to ensure being beaten – metaphorically – with the regs manual by Richard Woolsey in an interview which would take another interminable hour of his life he'd never get back, followed by which he would have to lose another hour, minimum, to a distinctly peeved Dr Beckett and apologise to a subtly scornful Ronan and an anxious Teyla for his _uncharacteristically harebrained_ (why was there a little voice deep inside sniggering at that?) Rambo moves.

Possibility (b) was exactly the same as (a) except that Woolsey was the one pressurising them not Rodney in which case everything would happen anyway except that Woolsey would bore him rigid _first_, then he and Rodney would have a scream-fest slanging match before Beckett got a-hold of him.

When in doubt, brazen it out…

"I'm less than half a click1 from the 'Gate and the terrain's fairly easy." John rattled off in pre-emptive appeasement. "Is everyone clear off the planet? Have Ronan and Lorne got the Pathrusim to their new site? Are the Asurans still attacking?"

"No, we're actually just breaking out the picnic hampers here," came back a strident snarl.

He so didn't have time for this, "_Rod-_"

"_Yes and yes_ to both questions. Now all I'm _waiting for_ is the Lone Idiot to come in from the Range."

Ooh – but not so fast Dr McKay. _I'm waiting_ not _we…_and John had asked three questions not two. "Rodney – are the Asurans still attacking?! What's your status?"

"I'm fine, the Stargate's fine but no rush, take your time, hey, they're only human-hating mass-murdering indestructible _KILLING MACHINES!_"

"Calm _down_, Rodney," worry over Rodney's probability of having a stress-induced stroke gave Sheppard's words a snap and a lack of tact he knew he would pay for later – there was silence over his earpiece bar a soft sort of 'un-uk' sound as if sheer rage had closed Rodney's throat to the extent words were stuck like a bottleneck. In fact in all probability that was exactly…

Movement – _too close_ – he spun ready to blast – and she stepped out in front of him, her face calm and composed. She was _always _composed. For an eternal instant he drank in her face, then his eyes finally registered the…_leather_?

He had only time to think how that combo was just _so_ _unfair_ as he was blinded by the light…

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued…

1 A 'click' or 'klick' (both spellings are acceptable, though the latter is more commonly used) is one kilometre (1,000 meters) or 0.6 of one mile. Click derives, as with so many wonderful phrases in both military and civilian 'languages' from military jargon, specifically the U.S. Military in this case. Used as early as WWII, and then in Korea (1950s), 'click' became popular usage amongst US troops stationed in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, particularly around the Mekong Delta.

The unit of distance measurement in those countries was the 'kilometre', so if you saw a sign that said, 'Saigon 60km' and had to radio that information it was easier and faster just to say '60 clicks' rather than try and work out the conversion from km to miles or other distance calculation. Given that communication via radio or phone could be problematic at best, the aim was to provide "maximum information in minimum time", so if you didn't know how long you'd be able to stay in contact, your 'priority' was always your need to convey words and ideas quickly but precisely under battle conditions without risking grave mistakes – often of the 'friendly fire' variety. This need for MIMT appears to have formed most military word-play.

'Click/klick' entered pop culture (pop being another contraction) by virtue of Hollywood movies and novels written in hard-boiled Cold War thriller styles, which mined the rich linguistic seams of soldier-speak - military 'language' is full of slang, shortened/contracted words and above all acronyms. The United States military branches in particular seem to love the latter; the website /TwinFalls/acronym6.html had over 3,000 US Naval acronyms alphabetically listed by 2000 alone. One example is STRAP – which is not a length of rope or belt for securing something, but is a _sonobuoy thinned random array program_. There you are then. Alternatively there is SWAMP – which means _severe wind and moisture problem_ or 'helluva storm here, people!' or 'bail faster!' in real terms. Shows like JAG, NCIS and the SEAL Team 16 thriller novels by Suzanne Brockmann (yes, all of which are 'acronym' names) have popularised things such as '24/7' (24 hours a day, 7 days a week) and SecNav (Secretary of the Navy), as well as MTAC and other abbreviations that we understand the _meaning of _without knowing the precise _wording_ of them. Other quasi-military phrases include 'frenemy' for someone who cannot be trusted as a friend, but who (probably) won't try and kill you either, 'sandpit' for the war in Iraq, 'o-dark-hundred' (midnight to normal people) and so forth.


	4. Chapter 4

Atlantis Chapter 4

He'd always opened his left eye first – it was just one of those things. Always as a kid, particularly when he didn't want or need to get up, he would raise his left eyelid a mere millimetre, so the merest sliver of daylight got past the faint outlines of his own eyelashes. If that proved ok, he'd try for a half-open eye, then the full enchilada.

Only when sure his brother wasn't trying to sneak up on him or Dad wasn't trying to 'train' him to bound out of bed fully alert did John add the other eye to the equation. It hadn't always worked, as he'd grown older – a few teenage sneak parties with sneakier beer had left him with vampire eyes – unable to tolerate sunlight, and often in the dying days of his marriage to Nancy he'd not wanted to open his eyes at all, though that was a purely psychological rather than physiological reaction.

The upside was that nothing hurt, the downside was that all John could establish was 'whiteness', so he opened both eyes and cautiously raised his head – good, still no pain. Where was –

Oh, bad. Badly badly bad. Apparently for all their mimicking of their Ancient creators, the Replicators hadn't quite grasped this season's _Intergalactic Interiors_ concept as yet. He was in a small 'white room' devoid of any fixtures or fittings and was, apparently, standing against a wall – though that may have been merely his eye-perspective because his head wasn't aching as if it had been lolling forward unsupported by his unconscious neck for any length of time.

Make that, _pinned_ to the wall. He looked down. A white 'plastic' band ran across his chest holding him in place, though he could breath comfortably. Around each wrist, holding each arm to the wall were similar bands, and he could feel another one across each ankle. The 'wall' was neither hot nor cold where his palm and fingers were resting against it, and totally smooth, nevertheless he was sure it was comprised of billions of Asuran nanites. He glanced down again at the band across his chest and those on his wrists – yep, the restraints just flowed seamlessly out from the wall and back into it again. No need for heavy chains and a bit of short-notice welding for these guys. And no need to guard the prisoner – nothing could break these bonds, up to and including a Wraith, who beat humans in the muscle-man stakes any day.

Abruptly _she_ was standing mere feet from him again. Her non-human status was obvious to him – you could wear that outfit, or you could breathe, but you couldn't do both. His mouth dried up faster than the Sahara in a heat-wave and he fixed his gaze on her – its – face. Great, five years of fighting the fantasising – the last thing his libido needed was the encouragement of _visual aids_. But…_no, the face, stick to the face, do not look below her chin, that's an order Sheppard!_

Unfortunately her face wasn't helping either. Elizabeth – the real Elizabeth – god, this was as confusing as real/dead Carson and new/clone Carson – had always been…what was that word, like the porpoise…_poised_. So was this one, who regarded him in currently silent contemplation. No matter how belligerent their superiors – or adversaries like the Genii's takeover attempts – or how dire their peril, Elizabeth had never lost it. She'd raised her voice but without yelling, gotten angry without ranting, been authoritative without ball-breaking hostility. That graceful neck had never been mottled and blotchy with ire and she had always maintained a subtle dignity even in _extremis_.

Then he looked into her eyes, and knew he could get through this. Elizabeth's eyes had ranged from serene celadon silver through bright spring-leaf green and glowing emerald to the grey-green of a storm-lashed sea and deep, deep jade depending on her emotions and the situation. But no matter what, they had always been lit by an inner spark, a warmth, whether it be of laughter, anger, relief or happiness. The eyes looking back at him were battleship grey – and as flat and empty and cold as pebbles on the bed of an icy mountain stream; they looked like they'd been painted on as an afterthought by something that didn't really need them. As long as he eyeballed the _eyes_ and not the face – or that leather – he was immune to the siren…

Which would probably get him brutally tortured to death but it wasn't like he had options here… "Uh…not to be nitpicky but it would've been best if you'd called first….I'm not really dressed up for going out here…"

Surprisingly it - she - quirked one eyebrow, "That is probably for the best…"

John opened his mouth automatically to retort but then almost swallowed his tongue as he realised she was both insulting his fashion sense _and_ making a joke at his expense.

His brain threatened to shut down again…soulless Oberoth-&-Co-type killers he could deal with, humour-lobotomised po-facers like Niam, not a problem…but…Replicators with wit and sex appeal? and indeed…"This from Miss Whiplash 08?" he engaged before he could stop himself.

"I always liked you in uniform."

"_Elizabeth_ always liked me in uniform…" – _she did?_ – "…and you're not her."

"I'm the only Elizabeth you have left."

"_Nuh-urh_!" he made the sound like the wrong-answer buzzer. "Elizabeth is alive and well – no thanks to you – and comfortably back home. So, like the adverts say –" he adopted that cheesy over-dramatic voiceover tone, "_Accept no substitutes!_'"

Once again she quirked an eyebrow, "But if you did not _have_ the organic, you would not be entirely sure that I _wasn't_ the organic. In fact, we both know I'm better than the original – my intellect is greater; I'm faster, stronger, invulnerable –"

"- amoral, sociopathic and homicidal," finished John, "which I think kinda ixnays the 'better' argument."

"And you have never done that which is morally questionable, or killed fellow humans."

"There's a vast chasm between that and a bunch of whiny-assed petulant brats bent on all out genocide 'cause their daddy spanked 'em one-time ten millennia ago. So mommy didn't love you – life's tough all over – could you people be any more self-obsessed? Get over yourselves already." He drew in a breath. "Look, let's cut to the chase here, ok. You're gonna come over all Borg, resistance is futile, yada-yada, and I'm _not _going to co-operate so just…do it…stick your hand into my brain like Robert Patrick in T2 or vent the O2 in here and watch me turn aubergine or let in a little hard vacuum and watch me go _spla-boom…_"

She – it? – remained impassive. "You need not die. If you…comply…you will be allowed to live."

'_Comply_'…_I will not comply_…good grief was that _still_ a sly Borg in-joke? _Focus on your gory impending death, here, John!_ His Id snarled – Oops. Yes indeedy. "I need not die…Somehow I doubt Oberoth's gonna go for that one."

She looked at him steadily, "That is of no consequence."

_Whoa…_John remembered Niam – painfully. Oberoth, the Psycho-in-Chief, was a one-hit wonder – his tune was immutable and impervious and ran to 'annihilate all Ancients, humans and Wraith in the Pegasus Galaxy as fast as possible by whatever means available' – as ultimate revenge against the Ancients who were arrogant enough to create the replicators in the first place, stupid enough to make them even more murderous than the Wraith, petulant enough to discard their toys when it didn't 'just work' first time out without them having to break a sweat, cruel enough to massacre their creation, dishonourable enough to cover that up and then cowardly enough to just scarper through the Stargate and leave their messes behind.

Thing was, Oberoth was one of those sociopathic bullies who believed he knew best and controlled everything and everyone around him 'for their own good'. In a human, he'd have a Messiah complex, like Hitler. There had been several replicators – more than several – who'd wanted to go their own way and walk their own path, including attempting Ascension, not in conflict with humanity, Wraith or Ancients. Oberoth's response to their independence efforts had been to massacre those kind of his 'fellow' replicators, strongly akin to the fanatic '_we'll save your souls by killing you_' problems caused by the religious nut jobs on Earth.

And Oberoth the Completely Bonkers was not of consequence – either Oberoth had been taken out by a _coup d'etat_, always a possibility with a mad dictator, or else (a) this replicator was attempting to string him along in the knowledge Oberoth would kill him anyway, or (b) was attempting to pull another Niam on the Big O.

"Sorry, not buying it…these dog-tags do not have MUG inscribed on them."

"My offer is genuine. If you serve us, you will be allowed to live." She commented.

"Oh please, could you be any more 1980s super-villain." He snapped. "So, to summarise, I betray my friends, Atlantis, the entire human species and in return I get…what?…to spend the rest of my life trotting about in a penguin suit going 'yes, m'lady'?"

"In return to you could have…Elizabeth."

Eliza- _whoa._

Wait…she was offering him…sexual favours? He was being _propositioned_…by an Elizabeth who looked like every S&M fetishist's ultimate fantasy.

Yet again, he could almost hear several neurons just blow a fuse… "Nu-_nnhk_," was all he manage.

She was suddenly _waaay_ too close. She raised her right hand, and traced her first and second fingers along his jaw from his ear to his chin with almost a gossamer touch…her fingertips brushed over the skin where he'd shaved that morning, cool and softer than his rougher skin, under his jaw bone over his strongly pulsing jugular to his throat just below his Adam's apple. Sensations shot through him, diverted past his intellect at light-speed and went straight to his hindbrain and his inner caveman…despite himself his eyes fluttered half-closed with that languorous response arousal caused in humans…strangely, however, that enabled him to grab back a little perspective. Block the sight, block the temptation…

"I retain everything known…and _felt_." Her tone was measured, serene, pure Elizabeth. "From the beginning you both knew there was…_this_…between you…"

Undeniable truth…so he didn't deny. Like Abe Lincoln had said, '_Just because someone is evil doesn't mean they aren't telling the truth_.' Bad guys would and could be veritable Georgie Washingtons if honesty suited their purpose.

"Now you can have this…"

"Can't…" John wanted to moan with relief – and despair – when she stopped stroking his face. "_Couldn't_. Chain of command…higher responsibility…selfish to give into our gonads and the hell with everyone else's welfare." _Yes, this is the way, give her the Greater Good lecture you've been beating yourself up with for five years…it's about time someone else got to share the misery_.

"But now you're outside the chain of command," she pointed out. "I am not in charge of Atlantis, John…but I can make being your commander…very pleasurable."

_OMG…_It was an offer than made his stomach flip and sent tingles where tingles had no right to be… "I can't."

"You think that dying a noble death in refusing to co-operate will make your Stargate Command any less likely to install a new CO – probably Colonel Caldwell or Major Lorne - within the week and to have already half-forgotten about you a month from now?" She looked faintly amused; probably because as she knew, the real Elizabeth had had no illusions about what would happen to her position as head of the Expedition if and when the real Elizabeth had been killed or permanently incapacitated. Enter Colonel Carter, and now Dr Woolsey: _The players change, but the game remains the same_. "You know you're disposable, but you won't save yourself?"

"I. _Can't_. Do. It." He enunciated, meeting her eyes squarely.

For the first time, uncertainty flickered in the dead pebbles as he locked his gaze and she determined the tonal emphasis; her eyes tightened slightly – irritation, confusion? Or just mentally shifting gears ready to start ripping off a limb at a time bare-handed for his refusal to give in?

Instead she clasped his chin between her thumb and forefinger – not hard, but not that gossamer taunting touch either, her eyes unwavering. "Why _can't_ you give me what I want, John?"

"Because…" There was a laundry list of reasons he could recite, all about loyalty and integrity and the greater good of humanity, and all of which were true, but the simplest and most profound of these was the most honest, and almost of its own volition rose to the surface of his tongue to spill out in blunt truth…"I belong to Elizabeth, _and you're not Elizabeth_."

For an eternal moment the words seemed to echo and re-echo louder and louder…but that could only be inside his own head…

And then he was blinded by the light…

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued… 


	5. Chapter 5

Atlantis Chapter 5

As he raised his finger to press the doorbell, John gave himself a quick once over in the glass pane strip next to the door – for the fiftieth or so time.

Wars had been fought with less planning than choosing his outfit for today's little excursion. It had taken him an hour to pick these jeans. They weren't his newest pair – those were still far too dark blue and stiff and _so_ 'trying far too hard'. They weren't his oldest pair either – those'd long been bleached with wearing to a point of threadbare patches that attempting public perambulation would have resulted in an indecent exposure arrest. These were his…_best_ pair of jeans…blue enough to be smart, faded enough to be casual, soft enough to discreetly mould his anatomy but not offensively cling inappropriately.

And they'd been the easiest attire. Every shirt he'd ever possessed was crumpled on his bed – no, not thinking of that, bad, bad – was scattered around his _room_ until he'd gone for this one – long-sleeved, because Massachusetts was cool this time of year, but light because it was summer-cool, not hypothermia cool. A nice bit of a V-neck with a couple of small buttons, a black cotton mix – smart casual again; you wouldn't yank it on to crash out round the house on a Slob Day but you wouldn't wear it to a 'bucking for promotion' dinner with your boss either.

His toes flexed in the soft, brown moccasin-style leather brogues he was wearing…were bare feet too _Miami Vice circa 1985_ retro? Too late now…and they'd gone best with this leather 'flight' jacket he'd picked. This was the trouble in a life where even 'dressing up' or 'down' meant you could just swap one type of uniform for another…you never needed to really put any _thought_ into your clothing choices as long as all necessary 'bits' were covered and you could fool the General-of-the-moment that you used a whole box of starch per wash. But a uniform would have made this _officially official_ instead of _my vacation plans are my business Woolsey_ and he would get into even more trouble than he was already going to get into – he'd most likely be back to Major Sheppard again by the end of the week.

And he didn't really care.

And he'd also been standing her with his finger millimetres from the bell for a good two minutes. Way _not_ to look like a total spaz1, John! He pressed the bell.

_Ding-dong_; a simple, short, generic chime. Classic Elizabeth Weir - functional, discreet, dignified. No Bart Simpson bellowing out 'EAT MY SHORTS!' in a puerile attempt at 'humour' but also no Tchaikovsky's '1812 Overture' pretentiousness either.

And the door swung back to reveal…Elizabeth.

Her brown hair cut in an attractive bob that accentuated her elegant neck, her face unmarked but paler than it used to be, with more of those fine lines around her silver-green eyes, and deeper ones each side of her mouth, that bespoke pain both physical and mental…

That mouth, which now transformed into a wide, welcoming smile as she stepped back without hesitation to allow him to enter, "John!" the unfeigned pleasure in her voice was like a brief taste of melted chocolate – smooth and sweet.

"Uh…hi…" his feet had taken over motor control for him, which was fortunate, since his brain wasn't capable of giving the 'move!' order.

She had obviously not long since returned from somewhere – no leather, thank god – but she was wearing a burgundy silk pant-suit with cream pumps and a cream silk blouse with those tiny pearl-like buttons that matched the pearl droplets in both ears and the single pearl threaded on a delicate gold chain necklace. A burgundy clutch purse had been dumped on the counter top over through the open-plan kitchen area. The whole ensemble was elegant, refined and professional but feminine – the essence of Elizabeth.

"How is everyone?"

Oh that voice, soft without being weak, gentle but with hints of steel. He would probably do anything that voice told him to. But…she thought he was here as part of some Atlantis collective representation. "Uh…fine…well – the usual. Rodney's a heart-attack waiting to happen – always arguing with Carson – the new clone Carson I mean – about his caffeine intake…Um, Ronan and Teyla insisted I convey their deepest respects and heartfelt wishes for your health…Teyla's fine and her baby son is doing great…and has Uncle Ronan and Uncle John wrapped around his chubby fingers…Radek talks to himself in Czech…which is actually most of the time swear-words by the way…"

Her smile ramped up from friendly to mischievous - and if his heart hadn't already been at her feet like an eager puppy wanting to be petted it would have shot from his chest like a bullet to get there – as she admitted, "I know…I speak a little Czech…_only_ a little…I have to confess I always found it too funny to let Radek know I knew what he was saying, especially when he called the Ancients who grabbed Atlantis back off us a bunch of 'stuck-up geriatric tosspots' – to their faces - and they didn't bat an eyelid."

He found himself grinning back at her. "Yeah…I'm getting to that stage now…I have to hide my face so he doesn't twig I know he's just called Woolsey a – well, you can imagine." He finished lamely; no way was he going to start swearing in front of Elizabeth and he _hadn't_ intended to metaphorically prod the elephant in the room - namely that Elizabeth was not going to and never would be able to return to Atlantis barring some future medical miracle.

When in doubt, forward momentum…"Uh, I'm actually Earthside on vacation for a few days…My brother needed to see me for some stuff…"

"How is your family?"

Yet another thing to fall in love with; not just politeness, but genuine concern for people she'd never met, after his father died of a heart attack last year. Of course, Elizabeth had already known about the long-term estrangement between Patrick and John Sheppard as it had been in his service records. They had not been reconciled when Patrick had died.

_Awkward_ was not the answer he wanted to give; and he wasn't here to talk about his brother…or his ex-wife.

Patrick's response to John's military career hadn't been as final as disowning him – Patrick's own brother, David, for whom his other son was named, had been USAF killed in Vietnam – but he had cut John out of his will and left the entire, and considerable, Sheppard side of the family wealth to David; of course, since Patrick and his wife both came from old money, and mom had not yet joined the choir invisible, it was likely _she _would redress the balance by leaving all her loot to _John_.

Or would have done had not David been having a major fit of the 'guilts' over Dad's will and spent the past few months pestering John via attorneys' letters to let Dave sign over half the assets to John. He didn't need his inheritance and didn't care – after all, what was being rich going to get him in the Pegasus Galaxy? The Wraith and the Asurans and the rest of the restless natives just wanted him dead – they didn't give a damn about his stock portfolio.

But it also turned out that Dave's 'guilts' were being added to by the fact that he had been 'out' with Nancy Sheppard – John's ex-wife. Out in the 'let's make babies' sense not 'out' in a casual fancy-meeting-you-here way. David had watched John like he was a time bomb counting down with _that_ admission.

And standing here with his tongue apparently glued to his palate, John knew why it hadn't bothered him at all. It wasn't that his marriage to Nancy had ended acrimoniously – paradoxically they were both to blame yet neither was at fault. As he'd told David in an attempt at reassurance and 'permission', "'marrying Nancy was the best thing '_Dad_ thought I'd ever done'".

And therein lay the rub; Patrick's approval hadn't been because Nancy was beautiful and intelligent and brave and capable and witty and accomplished – and Homeland Security big fish – even though she was all of those things and more. It had only been because of his hope – no, his expectation - that Nancy's work in America's Alphabet Soup of security agencies would make John give up this nonsense of flying rinky-dink aircraft for a living and settle for his own Man-in-Black outfit complete with corner office and pension plan whilst Nancy gave up her career to produce little Patrick and John Sheppard Jr to be the next generation of East-Coast educated old money Blue Chip stock Sheppards of Maine.

As David had made his nervous 'confession' John had been hit with a mini epiphany, realising that whilst he'd loved Nancy, he'd never been _in love _with her - but rather what she represented. For him, a way to both appease Patrick Sheppard and get him off his back for a while so he could concentrate on his military flying career with the Air Force. For Nancy, a way to appease her own stuck-in-the-1950s family who thought a woman's only route to fulfilment lay via the maternity ward and to negate the wariness of male colleagues who either refused to get a clue and relentlessly hit on her because she was single and therefore in their tiny minds a 'sexual slam-dunk', or those who thought that she was some ball-breaking man-hater who would nail them for harassment if they so much as smiled near her.

Everyone around them had relaxed and waited, depending on their desire, for the job change or maternity leave announcement and both had got their breathing space to do what they wanted. But months into the marriage John had known it wouldn't work – Nancy wanted children, eventually, but not with a husband who could be posted anywhere on the planet for months at a time and for whom she would be 'expected' to give up her own career. Likewise John wanted a wife who was committed to him and their family, not her next promotion.

Both had loved their careers _first_ and each other a distant second, and both had known it, which was probably why, subconsciously, both had made sure there were no children. Their marriage had been over long before Nancy's series of affairs – albeit discreet – had killed it. It was not so much her infidelities, but that she had had the first affair in the assumption that John had _already _committed adultery since their marriage hadn't been 'physical' for some time by that point and as he was a _man _not a woman... Yeah, because he was a _man_ he therefore had the self-control of a rabbit in spring and his solemn vows - spoken in public before man and god - to love, cherish and _forsake all others_ hadn't meant anything to him! One character assassination to go, thank-you Nancy.

And like Elizabeth, waiting expectantly, wanted to have all _that_ dumped on her…God, how long had he been standing here like a prize prune with his mouth open? _Talk, John…_"Er…" _oh very eloquent – shut up!_, he told himself…"It's been a difficult year…but…they're getting there…"

Yes…nice, short, non-specific…sounded meaningful but meant diddlysquat. Come on, John, forward momentum.

"Actually, I came to see you…to fill you in on what's happened."

Her eyes widened fractionally as she took a second look at his non-military clothing choice, and she segued effortlessly into 'commander of Atlantis expedition' mode. Far from slow on the uptake was Elizabeth Weir.

Yet again his heart clenched as, despite the fact that it obviously involved something about her, Elizabeth's face showed her concern for the consequences he was likely to suffer for this little _tête-à-tête_ and her voice took on that warning note she'd used on him in Atlantis when he'd gotten a bit too boisterous for her sense of what was appropriate. "Jo-_hn_…"

"It's common knowledge…and _you _need to know." He interposed quietly but firmly…_deep breath_…"There is an Asuran Replicator Weir."

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued…

1 In America, 'spaz' is a slang term for 'dork', 'fool' or 'idiot'. In Britain a 'spaz' is a slang term for Spastic or Spasticity, a recognised physical handicap like Down's Syndrome or Autism. I use the term in the American context, here, obviously, as it is how the character would think, act and speak. (E.g., Americans use "fag" for homosexuality, where to us "fag" is a slang term for a cigarette and "gay" is homosexuality. There are many other examples, like Americans using 'curb' for edge of the sidewalk and restraining their desire from something, whereas in Britain we step off the kerb-edge and curb our desire for chocolate.)


	6. Chapter 6

Atlantis Chapter 6

She blinked once, then for the first time looked down and away, half-turning from him as he stood, feeling a big ungainly lummox. "I…suspected…always…from the start – there had to be; Niam and the…copies of us made it inevitable."

"But to hear it, out loud and so _tactfully_ phrased by me…" John said wryly trying to inject a little self-deprecation in there to give her a target if she needed it.

She didn't; Elizabeth was always dignified, even in pain – it was one of the core signatures of her femininity; real women didn't squeal and wail and have histrionics, they sucked it up and dealt with dignity and fortitude.

"There's…no doubt?"

"None." He said it more flatly than he intended. "The replicator…was observed at close range."

"Fully functional? Nothing that would help distinguish it…?" _from me?_

For a brief moment John wished he could tell her it had been a cross-eyed hunchback. "You know the Asurans…when it comes to ripping-off masterpieces…"

She did smile at that. "I doubt anyone would pay as much for me as they would for the _Mona Lisa_."

_Try me_.

By some mercy he apparently had not said that aloud, for she carried on suddenly back in commander mode, with a hint of 'about to scold'. "And this is 'common knowledge' where?"

"It got all over the Pegasus Galaxy in about – half-hour, tops. The SGC knows, the President, most of IOA and the NID – which means the Trust will also know, though what good it'll do a bunch of washed-up Goa'uld I don't know."

"And you knew that I would be…" deliberately and spitefully "…kept out of the loop?"

"At first I'd bet they would've claimed your health wasn't up to it, then you weren't up to it psychologically, then they would have parroted about planetary security. So, we – " he shrugged, knowing she would understand the collective 'we' of Rodney, Ronan, Teyla and everyone else, "- were aware that _you_ deserved full disclosure even if others…disagreed."

"Thank you….all." It was since and elegant. "But John, you shouldn't be risk-…"

"Elizabeth!" _Whoa, too sharp, dial it down John-boy_. "Um…this is an incredibly invasive personal question I know, but…what the hell…have you ever been in a situation – a very personal, painful situation where you're left drowning in humiliation after you finally twig on to the fact that you are the _only person in a twenty mile radius who doesn't know_…" that the only guy with a pulse your wife wasn't having sex with was you and that everyone from Coronado to the Washington Navy Yard knew it? Oh yeah, that had been a whole knew level of self-disgust at how many people had been laughing and gossiping about Mr Oblivious for months.

She gave him an assessing look as if weighing him on some internal scales…and finding him worthy. "You mean like…what was supposed to be a romantic dinner forcing your fiancé to finally confess he's betrayed you…then that horrible twisting feeling in the pit of your stomach when you think back over the previous days and how you spent hours blithely chattering away to all your so-called mutual friends about the future you _thought_ you were going to have and it clicks that every one of them just stood there letting you prattle on knowing full well that you'd been replaced and were surplus to requirements?"

Even now there was bitter remembrance in her voice that John understood all too well. They'd never discussed such things but after they'd returned to Atlantis after the First Siege with him a new Lt. Colonel, the story had leaked that her fiancé, also a doctor, Simeon? Simon? One-of-the-two Wallace, had spent a goodly part of Elizabeth's first year in Atlantis cheating on her with a colleague he'd lined up as a replacement, more 'suitable' fiancée, i.e., one not so likely to eclipse his own rising star.

So he softly pointed out, "Like…_that…_yes. How would you feel if you found out months from now - and you remembered all those times you'd walked past smirking NID or IOA bean-counters in corridors and realised they _knew_?"

"Furious…humiliated…distraught." She blew out a breath. "Thank you…John…for making sure that won't happen."

Damn, he hadn't blushed since he was 17 and Dad had caught him indulging in some onanistic self-help in the shower with a Playboy centrefold visual aid – but now, a simple 'thank-you' and he was a bipedal beetroot.

"And there's absolutely no chance that there could be _any_ mistake?"

"None." He hadn't meant it to come out so definitive; he realised - a split-second too late - that something in his tone had alerted her to what he had no intention of revealing.

"Who _did _confirm the replicator's ID?"

_Shit…_ "…"

"J_oh_n?"

"Um…it was…me."

Elizabeth Weir had been administrator of Atlantis for three years, well-practiced in perceiving when her 2IC was trying to _not_ tell her something she would have to reprimand him for doing. Now that quiet but inexorable inflexion of command served her well. "How _did_ you get close enough to positively ID the replicator Co- John?"

It was too ingrained in him not to answer, but so was too much admiration, respect and…love…to give her the insult of trying to lie. "Uh…she – it – captured me for a while."

Elizabeth went very still; her own captivity had undoubtedly been far from pleasant. But there was only concern for _him_. "John…did she…it torture you?"

"No!" _Not in the way you mean_…He gave her the Cliff Notes about Pathrus, and the appearance of the Weir replicator.

"…_Leather_?" Elizabeth repeated this – for the second time, somehow seeming to find this the hardest concept to grasp.

"Well, not actual cowhide but I presume sort of hi-tech Asuran cloth. It's how I knew – I mean, if you hadn't already been…rescued anyway…I would've know it was a replicator because for all I know the stuff was spray-painted on. No way could a human woman wear that and still breathe." His mouth seemed to have been hijacked from his brain's control and his desperate desire to _stop _talking, "It was very…_chi-chi _dominatrix."

Her eyes widened helplessly and her lips crimped with the effort of restraining unwilling giggles. "_Chi-chi dominatrix…oh my god._"

His own laugh had more than a tinge of hysteria to it. "Uh yeah. Anyhow she – it – whatever did the whole Dr Evil 'serve me and live' _shtick_ and I declined, impolitely."

But she was looking at nothing, pensively, anxious. "It would know _everything_ I knew up to the point of…"

He didn't say anything because all codes were changed the instant any 'sensitive' member of personnel went AWOL or failed to report in, and Elizabeth knew that, but Elizabeth was also far too intelligent and perceptive not to also know –

"…including my personal…_feelings_ about…things." She looked at him steadily and her gaze was sharper, chillier as if trying too look inside him and see – not falsehood - but _inhumanity_…like a billion nanites making him a facsimile of the real John Sheppard. They both knew how the nanites could screw with your brain – nanites had wiped out several members of Rodney's team by brain aneurysm their first year there, and her whole hallucination of being in a psych' ward with the Stargate program nothing more than a trauma-induced delusion had reiterated the lesson, even before she'd ended up spending lots of unwilling quality time with the Asurans.

"Do you think I would've got anywhere near Earth if I was a replicator?" he tried to inject jocularity into his tone but it fell flat. "I know I'm not a replicator, it was the first thing we checked after I-"

"Escaped?" her tone conveyed their mutual acknowledgement of the unlikelihood of one man escaping the clutches of even one much faster, stronger, virtually indestructible robot, never mind a shipful of them. "How did you escape, John?"

So accurately she struck the raw, unhealed centre of his misery. "I…don't know…" his eyes found the carpet then dragged themselves up to see…

Compassion, and empathy, not judgement and suspicion…but then she'd been found comatose and barely alive in a mangled mess of space debris after being MIA for nearly a year. She knew what it was like to live with vast tracts of time that were ominous blanks.

_Get a grip, John_. "She was wanting me to…y'know…betray everyone in exchange for my life…there was this sudden loud noise…so, I guess either the pilot nodded off and we clipped a space rock or I think a Hive ship must have opened fire on us. There was a…flash…then I was…"

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued… 


	7. Chapter 7

Atlantis Chapter 7Back on Pathrus in a crumpled heap right in front of the Stargate…and no way was he trying to go anywhere through it after being imprisoned on a Replicator ship.

"Rodney!" he tried his earpiece, but all that met him was silence. He could have been gone hours or days…or…

John's brain veered off from that one. The last thing he wanted was another lump of time lost to him…he was already 40,000 years and six months older than everyone else…even to himself, the joke fell flat.

So, Option B…he dialled Atlantis from the DHD but didn't step through – they would have the iris up anyway and his intent was only provide a conduit for his earpiece. "RO-OD-NEY! RONAN!"

"SHEPPARD!" the bellow was definitely McKay, as it managed to be shocked, furious and delighted all in one tonal inflexion. "WHERE ARE YOU?!"

"_Pathrus_. Listen –"

"You're _kidding_. We only had to fall back through the 'Gate an hour ago –"

One hour? That was it? _Thankyouthankyouthankyou._

"…the iris…"

"NO!" into the distinctly nervous silence, John drew a breath and ordered more moderately, "Rodney, tell Woolsey I need Major Lorne and a _full tactical unit_ – no, make it two – through the Stargate on my mark, loaded for bear. I also need Ronan, armed and homicidal, and Carson, you and every portable probe, prodder and medical scanner you can carry, drag or shove through the 'Gate, prepped and working."

"Are you…incapacitated?" Rodney used the word as an obvious euphemism to cover everything from 'talking to us with a gun pressed against your throat' to 'horribly mutilated with bits of you scattered around the place'.

"No…Rodney, I've just spent sixty whole minutes captive aboard an _Asuran Replicator ship_ being given the Catwoman treatment by an Elvira, Mistress of the Dark version of Elizabeth Weir. There is no way I can risk going _anywhere - _through the Stargate or otherwise, until I'm _sure_ that I am…_who I think I am_."

Rodney McKay wasn't a genius for nothing. "We'll be there in five…McKay out."

It had actually been closer to twenty minutes of John standing there brooding, looking at his hands and resisting the temptation to pull out his aircrew knife1 and do a little DIY surgery – or amputation – and seeing if the wound healed itself in a mere second…because what would he do if it _did?_

He stepped back as the 'Gate activated and quickly placed his P-90 and his 9mm on the DHD along with his aircrew knife. If he _was_ a replicator programmed to overpower the extraction team and try and make it back to Atlantis, giving them extra seconds to blast him full of holes as he tried to reach his weaponry would make him feel slightly better – _and surely only the real Sheppard could have that whacked-out a worldview?_

Evan Lorne came through the 'Gate first, which didn't surprise John in the slightest; such an action was partly why Lorne had seniority amongst the Expedition's three Majors and why John had picked him as his own 2IC. Real leaders, of either sex, came in the form of those whose attitude was '_follow me_' and not '_I'm right behind you_'. Lorne would not order his people blindly in first to an unknown situation, even though it increased the risk of _him _being a casualty. Colonel Sumner, for instance, had been cut from the same cloth, and had died because of it; John often regretted he had not been able to demonstrate to Sumner that he was _more_ than a cocky, rich dilettante 'playing' at being a USAF officer – that he could be depended on to be a professional, skilled soldier who took care of his people and protected those who had no means to defend themselves.

The soldiers fanned around John, their weapons pointing at him with unnerving precision, an admixture of Earth-style projectile weapons like P-90s, MP5s and fancier zat-style techno-weapons. More forethought by Lorne; over the years many had suggested the SG teams should entirely replace projectile-weapons like lead-bullet guns with zats or staffs or other advanced alien weaponry, but they remained for the simple reasons that they were far less expensive to produce, much easier to use – and less delicate. An MP5 bashed around on the forest floor or dunked in a river could take a lot more damage and keep working than a zat, which tended to end up a useless collection of shattered power crystals if you tapped it too hard.

Ronan came next, his powerful body seeming to shrink the immediate area. He took up a watchful but not hostile stance facing John whilst ensuring he didn't get in the way of the soldiers' line-of-sight – still, he made John feel better, just by exuding that supreme confidence that replicator or not, he could put John down without breaking a sweat or actually injuring John too much (probably true, ego-bruising though it was to admit).

Finally there came Rodney, Carson – plus Zelenka, Rodney's sort-of-significant other Dr Katie Brown (though apparently the romance was definitely off at this point) and that hyperactive pathologist who talked _more _and _faster_ than Rodney McKay if such were possible – damn he was blanking on her name…weird…something to do with writing…_Biro_. That was it – like the pen…in fact she was apparently a cousin of the guy who'd invented it.

Carson was pale and grim, Rodney…had moved on to ashen, moving in that sharp, jerky manner he had when he wanted to scream vituperatively at John but was also frantically worried about him…'_Rodney has got to learn to emote more positively – or at least expel negative feelings constructively,_'Dr Heightmeyer's opinion echoed in John's head as he tried to distract himself from what he was afraid his friends were about to discover…'_he flounders with anything even_ _slightly genuinely emotional; he seems to be incapable of publicly displaying any emotions other than rage or sarcasm._' John noticed a barely perceptible but surely somehow bluish cast to Rodney's lips…just how much faster than 'normal' did his friend's heart labour?

"Riiyt, Curr'nul," Carson's stress exaggerated his Scottish burr almost to the point of incomprehensibility.

John moved forward and stood stoically as Carson, Rodney and the others began to gingerly draw blood, run scanners over him and generally made him feel like a lab-rat…

© 2008

C D Stewart

To be continued…

1 The US Military has several 'survival/fighting knives' associated with each service. Possibly the most famous is the Ka-Bar or K-Bar fighting knife of the United States Marine Corps (USMC), which is – so I've been told - also favoured by U.S. Navy SEALs, though this is not so much a 'survival' knife as it is a weapon – it's designed to stab people, not skin rabbits or whittle firewood.

The 'Big Four' are the United States Air Force aircrew survival knife and the United States Marines Corps K-bar knife – already mentioned – plus two generic types – a hollow handle "specialized" survival knife, and a good quality sheath knife.

Some writers watch/slo-mo/freeze-frame a lot of the 'filler' or 'look-at-our-boy's-toys' shots for story research and to ensure we get the details right vis-à-vis insignias and uniforms _et al_ (ahem…)

Anyway, if you do this, particularly in Season 1, or where the team are exploring off-world, you can clearly see Sheppard and Ford and Lorne _et al_ with a fairly large knife in a black sheath hanging down in front of their spine at the back of their protective/body-armour torso gear. As a USAF Colonel, Sheppard's primary knife would doubtless be the USAF aircrew knife. For 'technical accuracy' the show's Marine characters (e.g., Sergeant Bates from Season 1 & Season 4 episode _Outcast_) should be shown with a K-Bar not an aircrew knife - though I have nowhere near the knowledge to tell the difference, I'm sure Americans who are fans of the show and military servicemen/women can tell with a glance.

As far as I know, however (bearing in mind that I'm a civilian Brit) there is nothing to stop a military person from choosing his or her preferred knife from one of these four or indeed any other of the several differently-designed 'fighting knives' available, including carrying one of each if they wanted to cover all the bases. On saying that, I doubt a Marine would deliberately choose an aircrew knife as his 'primary' blade and vice versa unless he or she wanted to elicit critical comment and derision from fellow Marines/Air Force/SEALs, etc.


	8. Chapter 8

Atlantis Chapter 8

"So…no nanites…" John finished. "I'm just me. I guess there must have been a Wraith attack on the Asurans after all…"

"…At least you hope so…" she acknowledged sympathetically.

He nodded, "Truth? I don't want to think she _just let me go_…it makes me feel too…killer secretary."

That was a bridge too far and a faint dint appeared in her forehead as she tried to assimilate the reference.

"Uh…in the James Bond movie…the Evil Bad Guy has slipped a mind-control bracelet on this sweet middle-aged secretary lady – all blue rinse and pearls. He presses the button and she just blasts away with a gun then goes back to normal without having the slightest memory or idea of what she's just done – the perfect, unwitting assassin." John shrugged. "I have…a deep-seated fear of snapping back into it one day and finding myself standing in the middle of my friends' bodies with no memory of just massacring the lot of them."

"And you have no memory of how you got from the ship back to Pathrus?"

"Nuh-uh…" he shrugged helplessly, "One minute I'm giving _Elvirabeth_ that whole I'm- not-that-kind-of-boy the next…face first in the grass…"

"How _exactly_ did she try and force you to betray us?" Elizabeth arched one eyebrow at him.

"Um…more like persuasion. Brainwashing…"

The eyebrow remained raised in silent query; an effective ploy to make the intended recipient rush to fill the silence with words.

Quite effectively, "Well, like I said…" oh was this embarrassing, "…she basically offered to me make me her…" _boy toy? Sex slave? Walking vibrator?_ "…er y'know…as well as not killing me of course."

"The replicator Weir _propositioned _you?" she didn't seem to know whether to laugh or be outraged.

"Um…"

"And you refused."

"No, we got naked there and then…_yes I refused!_" he snapped, feeling the heat flood his face.

"That must have made her…very angry." Elizabeth pointed out. "You had to work on the assumption you would be killed whether you co-operated or not…strategically the thing to do would have been to…ah…pretend to play along and then seek a chance to escape whilst feeding them phoney intel'."

Oh, and hadn't _that_ seductively treacherous rationale crossed his mind – insistently – several times whilst Replicator Weir was doing her S&M Bondage Queen routine. "That…wouldn't have worked…I told her I couldn't…"

Elizabeth's eyes were very dark – almost charcoal - and somehow she was more _over here_ than she had been _over there_ a moment ago. "What _did _you say to her offer, John?"

_Nnuk_… "I just told her…" he needed more air for some reason; her perfume impinged on his nostrils – delicate, understated, floral without being cloying or overpowering – and with a mini-epiphany he realised why closing his eyes had helped against Asuran Weir…replicators had no body scent, so once the distraction afflicting his other senses had been partly negated, the effect was lessened. Now, however, he seemed to be breathing in that unique scent of _Elizabeth_ like it and not the air was oxygen…and the truth set him free… "…"'_I belong to Elizabeth, and you're not Elizabeth._'""

Somehow her lips were against his own; soft but confident, sure but gentle…no harsh pressure, no greedy devouring – it was pure Elizabeth – feminine, dignified. His hands had lifted and clasped her upper arms lightly as they kissed.

"Do you, John?…" She kissed the words to his lips…he could feel the warmth of her fingers as her fingers curled into his shirt and he parted his lips to allow her…_everything_…her other hand…

Rested, palm-flat against the material of his jeans stretched across his abdomen, so close to…her palm felt like not just warmth but burning against his body…Her lips paused in their wonderful contact…"…Do you belong to me?"

…That hand waited…not for permission…because she did not need permission to touch that which was hers…she awaited…acknowledgement.

"_Yes…_"

And somehow he was half-sitting against the back of the couch…Elizabeth _Elizabeth Elizabeth_ tangled in his lap, their mouths fused and all those little cream buttons open and she had her hand tangled in his hair and her other hand…her fingers stroked deftly, massaged carefully but surely…until she paused in those deliriously sweet caresses and looked down slightly into his glazed eyes… "I wonder if Sue Ling's costume store is still open?"

"Costume…?" was all he could articulate from this _non sequitur…_his brain was porridge, and he didn't care…

Her eyes locked with his… "_Chi-chi dominatrix_…"

And he was blinded by the light…

© 2008

C D Stewart

NB - if you want, this story can end here. It has been mentioned to me that I have not, in some opinions, finished it off fully, so for those that want a bit extra, there will be an epilogue posted shortly.


	9. Chapter 9

Atlantis Epilogue…

"…'N' then they got _maah-rid_." He sing-songed, shifting his feet and turning away towards the puddle-jumpers.

"Actually they didn't."

He stopped at this and tilted his head up as he looked at her dubiously. He'd evinced as much interest as could be expected in her child-friendly recounting of Colonel Sheppard and Dr Weir's situation but he was a perfectly normal little boy, which meant his focus was on getting straight to what the museum staff wryly called the 'testosterone central' exhibits.

"Grown-ups get married so they can do all that kissing stuff." The words were faintly challenging; as a fully eight-years-old 'man of the world', he was sure of the fact that grown-ups who kissed had to get married. It was the _rules_.

"That's normally true, but Colonel Sheppard and Dr Weir – John and Elizabeth…couldn't get married."

Scowl at the idea one of his testosterone-heroes was _unable_ to do something. Dr Weir didn't count – sure she'd been _brainy_ but she'd been a girl and girls were just weird and annoying. "Why not?"

"The…logistics were impossible."

"What're…Loh-Jiss-Ticks?"

"Logistics is what you have to do to make sure what you plan to do works," she defined in child-friendly terms. "Like…when your parents took you on vacation, they couldn't just get up that morning, throw stuff in suitcases and set off…they had to do the logistics first. That included booking vacation time from their work, finding a nice hotel, making sure they could afford the cost, arranging for Mrs Overmeyer to come and check your cats and the mail for the week. All those things had to be in place and work for you to be able to go on vacation."

"And they couldn't fix their luh-jisticks?" He looked at her steadily.

"No, they couldn't." It was amazing how difficult it was, this first outright lie she'd uttered, rather than carefully phrased mostly-truths. Logistics had had nothing to do with Weir and Sheppard never making it to an altar, malice had.

It wasn't any great leap for anyone interested enough to check to guess _why_ Colonel Sheppard had taken two days out of his already extremely short vacation to visit Dr Elizabeth Weir; and there were plenty of people interested for reasons of spite and other mean-spirited motives. He'd returned to the SGC and an unpleasant interview with Dr Richard Woolsey who – with surprising authority – had overridden General Landry by pointing out that Sheppard was _his_ Chief Military Officer, not the SGC's. Astonishingly, perhaps Woolsey had had a heart after all; maybe that was why Sheppard had escaped with a 'letter of instruction' on his P-file instead of a more serious 'letter of admonition' – or even the dreaded 'letter of reprimand' that left careers dead in the water.

Whatever the case, he'd been smart enough not to give any clue that his visit had involved anything more than just giving Elizabeth the heads-up about her Asuran copy. However, his team quickly figured it out, starting with Ronan Dex. The Satedan was aware that humans for some reason made a correlation between size and stupidity and that some people presumed his IQ decreased in direct proportion to his bicep size. Since being 'assumed' to be big and dumb had saved his ass in several water-up-to-the-willows-and-still-rising situations, he had never bothered to 'explode the myth'. But Ronan was smart, _very_ definitively masculine, a warrior and a fellow comrade-in-arms…enough to twig on that John Sheppard, however discreetly, was happy in that peculiarly 'male sexual fulfilment' way. Again, it was no great strain to connect the dots.

Teyla Emmagen, also, was a warrior and no fool; she had no naïve romanticism, certainly not as the mother of hybrid son at constant risk of kidnap by the Wraith Michael, a baby whose baby's conception owed more to technology rather than…'oh yeah, let's get horizontal' mutual passion. Her maternity had probably made her _more_ aware of the nuances.

Rodney, less perceptive about 'emotional subtleties' but having the genius brain, hadn't been slow either. In fact, Rodney had taken on a sort of 'perpetual best man' role and ganged up with Ronan and Teyla to 'facilitate and enable'. Any long-distance relationship is a strain and requires total commitment from both parties…one conducted across several galaxies where the two participants only saw each other for a few days several months apart and were surrounded by those who would severely disapprove required heroic mutual effort and diligence. Rodney had come up with several handy solutions, as well as devious schemes cooked up by his more than willing partner-in-crime, Radek Zelenka, including taking 'ensemble' vacations with John, himself, Ronan, Teyla and the baby to visit Elizabeth _en masse_. The fact that he, Ronan, Teyla and the baby discreetly cleared off about…oh two minutes later…was nobody else's concern.

And when busybodies had tried to make it so, they found themselves pitted against a brilliant mind determined to ensure his friends' privacy was protected and their relationship maintained against snoopers, prurient prying interferers and other self-appointed judge-jurors. They also found out the hard way their folly in making a scientific genius they needed far more than he needed them _very angry_.

So there had been other attempts to derail what some took it upon themselves to decide and decree was not permissible, often on spurious grounds. The fact that Elizabeth was no longer any part of John's chain-of-command had been a big spanner in those machinations, but a lot of sniping had been made, both verbally and in written, officiously grandiloquent 'reports', about 'over-familiarity', 'breakdown of chain of command', 'fraternisation'; as well as 'sends the wrong message'. There had also been unacceptable commentary about the fact that Sheppard was a few years younger than Elizabeth and…it had been uttered with salacious innuendo…the _junior_ partner.

Idiots; like sexist morons who believed that 'machismo' was a synonym of 'manliness', when instead it was diametrically opposite to everything a real man was, they assumed 'submissive' was a synonym of 'subservient'. John Sheppard hadn't got a subservient cell in his entire body and never had had; _if_ he chose to be submissive it was by _consent_, not coercion - and the mutually-agreed dynamics of his and Elizabeth's relationship was nobody else's business but their own.

But, Elizabeth had been consistently refused passage to Atlantis, the Atlanteans who John and Elizabeth would have wished to share their joy were never able to get Earthside at the same time – if Rodney got vacation, Radek Zelenka would be refused; if John Sheppard got vacation, Evan Lorne would be on duty. By mutual agreement, the couple refused to have a 'make do' ceremony unless everyone they cared for and wanted to be present had been able to attend.

So they just carried on, and the gleeful 'derailers' instead found that they had created nothing but ill will and censure for themselves. An even worse backfiring from their viewpoint was that Elizabeth and John's dignified conduct in the face of such undeserved contempt and disrespect elicited support and even co-opted assistance from those whose conservative nature meant that they otherwise disapproved, strongly, of John and Elizabeth's relationship. Richard Woolsey, generally a by-the-book stickler, General 'Hank' Landry, a definitely non-fraternisation martinet, and John's far-from-friend fellow-officer Colonel Caldwell had all moved from silent disapproval to subtle acts of support out of disgust at the wilder accusations and more extreme attempts at sabotage they witnessed.

"But what about when they had _children_…" he pounced.

"John and Elizabeth never had any children."

"Not _any_?"

"No."

"Why?"

Ah, now they came to his focal point. He was facing her fully, his intention of heading straight to the Ronan and Teal'c exhibits to play with the weaponry and re-enactments of combat interactive displays completely if temporarily forgotten.

This was what it was all about – after six years as an only child, his parents had spent most of his seventh year telling him they were going to give him something wonderful. Instead of the completely flyable (and expensive) working model of Atlantis with puddle-jumpers and battery-powered programmable action-figures he'd got instead…a baby brother: smelly, screaming and non-programmable.

Months of bottled up resentment had come to a head in a running-away attempt and, when his parents had caught up at Grand Central, a _very _public temper tantrum off the scale involving 'you lied', 'you kept telling me I was getting a great present', 'I hate you' 'I'm not coming home, I'm to find a new mom and dad to live with until you get rid of it', 'I don't care what's it's called!' 'I hate you and that thing!' and '_No! No! Let go! No!_ _Get off me! I'm not coming! No!_' finished off by a wild bout of thrashing and kicking and blind running which had almost ended in tragedy had he not been grabbed before he ran, due to unseeing fury, into the path of a car.

Both parents and child had been devastated – he would not forgive their deception and they could not, of course, acquiesce to the rejection of one child by the other. The fact that child who had been the centre of his family for six years would be unlikely to react well to a sibling everyone else doted on and cooed over at his expense was a reality that in retrospect they had hidden from and been in denial about.

Finally, though, came the Bright Idea. Showcase the positive 'sibling affection', the camaraderie that had existed between his heroes – Jack O'Neill and Teal'c, John Sheppard and Ronan Dex and so on. All kids knew them, that was part of their appeal, and the permanent Washington D.C. exhibits were easily accessible at the Smithsonian. It was ideal for a kid whose focus involved anything to do with spaceships, saving the universe from Ori/Wraith/Goa'uld/Replicators, being able to use zats and 'P-90s' at the interactive displays.

Even better, Phase two of the Idea would subtly reinforce the bonds his heroes had shared – those individuals had been part of a _family_; the lack of genetic connection between them had been utterly irrelevant to that fact. By getting him to absorb the fact that Sheppard, Weir, Ronan Dex, Teyla Emmagen, McKay, Zelenka and all the others as well as General O'Neill, Cam Mitchell, Sam Carter, Teal'c, Daniel Jackson etc., had respectively been family to each other, it would encourage him to make room for the baby he currently saw only as an intruder, an unwanted nothing-but-bad interloper.

Most important, tell him some of the individual stories, the missions that _hadn't_ gone according to plan, those situations where his heroes had been in conflict with _each other_ rather than a common enemy, where they had had to adjust to new team mates, where they had had arguments with each other, where they had been angry with each other and yelled and stomped off…but they had come back, because they were family, and they loved each other and cared for each other, and that was more important than anything.

It wasn't as if there was any _dearth _of material; SG-1 alone provided entire volumes full, even if you didn't count any of the other SG Teams or the Atlantis Expedition teams. Perhaps the most serious had been the estrangement between Daniel Jackson and Jack O'Neill following the Euronda mission – and the latter's hairbreadth brush with the disaster of enabling a bunch of genocidal racists to massacre half their planet. Then there had been the 'death' of the Milky Way's Replicator progenitor, and the tension _that _caused.

Or for a different flavour, there had been the Sheppard-McKay Bicker-thon. The two men's entire friendship was based on the fact that they were, apparently, just engaged in one perpetual argument that they continued with their entire lives, occasionally meandering off at tangents and convoluted side-detours. Again, there had been actual estrangements – McKay's obsessive-compulsive disorder led to him blocking out rationality half the time and had it not been for Sheppard he would have killed himself as well as wiping out of the Duronda solar-system trying to make an anti-Wraith weapon work. But conversely Sheppard too often forgot McKay wasn't his underling; what about those times he had blamed and berated McKay for failing to meet his wholly unrealistic expectations of a McKay Instant Miracle – just add hot water and stir.

So now she said, "You know Elizabeth Weir was kidnapped by the Asuran Replicators and it took a long time for her to get better?"

"Yeah…"

"Well, she wasn't able to have children."

Again, truth, surrounded by a bodyguard of lies – or at least big fibs. It was true that Elizabeth had been a few years older than John Sheppard when the Atlantis Expedition was first commissioned, but that wouldn't have been a problem with the reproductive technologies available even many years down the line. The sticking point had been the Asuran nanites it was impossible to remove from Elizabeth's body. Sure they'd remained consistently dormant, but there was no way to predict whether the presence of a foetus would reactivate them, whether to protect it or harm it, or what they would then proceed to do. After all, what would Elizabeth and John do if the baby transpired to possess Replicator nanites in his or her physiology?

In addition to that, Rodney had picked up on a nebulous Trust plot to kidnap any child for 'experimentation' on exactly that basis. And that would've ended up in the bloodbath to end all others, pity the fools who snatched John Sheppard's child…a few MIB wannabes with snakes in their heads thought they would get the better of a man who had solidly kicked Wraith and replicator ass, as well as his equally as motivated friends – like genius Rodney and _über-warrior_ Ronan Dex?

"But…" he scuffed his sneaker on the tile as he struggled to formulate the question, now fully engaged with the story, "…they y'know…were _happy_ right?" he awaited confirmation with clear anxiety.

"Yes, they were…"

_Mostly_…Of course neither of them nor the world in which they lived had been perfect, far from it, but John and Elizabeth had known what they were getting into from the beginning, and just how much hard work, ability to laugh at themselves – and willingness to forgive each other – would be necessary.

In all their life together, there had only been one serious glitch, a brief estrangement a few years in when there had been pressure on all sides – the Ori and the Wraith had been squeezing, there had been incredible tensions, injuries, losses, increasing public awareness of the Stargate, 'disagreements' with terrestrial and galactic allies and, always, the greedy and power-hungry remorselessly following their own agendas no matter what innocents got hurt or dead to get what they wanted.

Elizabeth had been deeply involved in intensive negotiations with her counterpart – a middle-aged, affluent, handsome bachelor noted as a womaniser – and John had fought some hard-won missions against the Wraith, losing two good men in the process, and nearly having Evan Lorne make it three, had it not been for some epic surgery by Jenny Keller and the man's sheer refusal to die. Made irrational by stress, John had believed Elizabeth was having an affair, and a visit to Earth had resulted in heated accusations of her adultery. The upshot of which was that Elizabeth had ended their relationship.

Of course, once he'd stormed back to Atlantis and vented, Ronan had called him an idiot, then Teyla, then Rodney, then Radek – Lorne had actually called him to the infirmary and delivered a grossly insubordinate opinion of his CO's IQ and character defects …even Richard Woolsey had called John into his office and elucidated the irrationality of John's viewpoint as if John were a rather slow-witted child. As Woolsey pointed out, people who have been terribly betrayed in such a manner as adultery by someone they loved and trusted implicitly are highly unlikely to go and do the same thing to a subsequent partner, _precisely because they know how devastating it is_. Both John and Elizabeth had previously been on the receiving end of such a betrayal, and John's accusations had been a grievous insult to Elizabeth's integrity and loyalty. By then, such interventions were largely unnecessary as John realised his own insecurities – and a strong predilection to being jealous – had resulted in a set of self-created fears and anxieties.

Unfortunately, Elizabeth hadn't been accepting _any_ contact from John Sheppard by any media; they were over, done, _finito_. Emails, calls, letters, attempts to personally see her (she'd changed the house locks, all her numbers _and_ had him barred from her offices) – were all flatly rebuffed. Not even John's increasingly desperate pleas through Drs Beckett and Keller, Lorne, Radek, Ronan, Teyla and even Colonel – by then Brigadier-General – Sam Carter had elicited any softening; he'd even gone higher, but Lt. Generals Landry and Hammond and Major-General O'Neill had, wisely, steered clear – as had the President.

Happily, John had one ace-in-the-hole, the relentless, the inexorable, the King of Pester Power…Rodney McKay. The legend had it that Rodney wangled a visit to Elizabeth Weir and simply wore her down by 48-hours of non-stop talking, though that was highly unlikely. But whatever the truth, it had been Rodney McKay who had taken action to heal the breach and reconcile the pair, a debt he had – gleefully - never, ever, ever let John Sheppard forget he owed him. Apart of that one brief skid though, their relationship had survived the many various rocks deliberately or incidentally hurled against it.

"…_always happy_…?" he repeated the question, determinedly.

And she understood the sub-text; he was a lot more tolerant of his toddling brother now, but he wanted the reassurance about this seismic change in his family. _Do mom and dad still love me? Am I important to them? What if they love my brother more than me?_ He was only eight, and like all children, believed in happily-ever-after.

"Yes, they were."

She gave the confirmation snap and authority. After all, it was true. Though they'd never been able to formalise their relationship, John Sheppard and Elizabeth Weir had had twenty years together, years of a deep and enduring love, until Elizabeth had died in her sleep, a massive blood clot stopping her heart between one beat and the next, so fast not even the dormant nanites within her body had responded. Barely into her sixth decade she had been far, far too young in a society where people were by then living active healthy lives until their mid-120s, but John and Elizabeth had treasured their time together because they both knew how incredibly lucky she was to have that time at all.

But she'd done enough subtle psychological sign-posting for today, and it was time for a bit of old-fashioned shoot-'em-up fun. "So, do you want to visit the Ronan exhibit first or the Teal'c one? I hear that the Ronan's got a new Wraith Dart versus Puddle Jumper game pod?"

"_Coool_. Yeah, Ronan!" he grinned happily and they set off; he looked up at her. "Er…y'know stories about how grown-ups are romantic and stuff…?"

"Yes?"

"How did General O'Neill and General Carter come to get married?"

© 2008

C D Stewart

**Author's Note:**

Of all the female 'Stargate' characters, I liked "Elizabeth Weir" the most, because Torri Higginson's portrayal reminded me of _JAG _character "Sarah Mackenzie".

I only saw a couple of _JAG _Season 1 eps, and its cancellation didn't surprise me – I couldn't tolerate the buxom, blonde breathy 'Melanie Griffiths lite' 'Meg Austin' character and she was totally implausible. When I accidentally caught an episode a couple of seasons later with Catherine Bell as the female lead, I couldn't believe the depth and believability she brought to the role of a female Marine and became an avid viewer of the show till the end, plus the NCIS spin-off.

I have to admit in _Children of the Gods_ my first sight of Amanda Tapping nearly had me hitting the 'off' button. She saved Stargate for me by her droll delivery of that 'we had to MacGyver' line; her performance as Sam Carter was never less than excellent in terms of being so much more than the 'token female lead' – she was Catherine Bell without being brunette.

So, yes, I winced when I saw Jessica Steen in _Lost City Part 1 & 2_, because I'd been expecting a 'hot blonde'. I took one look and it confirmed my suspicion that _male _American TV executives/network 'suits' came only in two flavours – middle-aged sexist dinosaurs going through the male menopause, or 23-year-old just-graduated college know-it-alls who emotionally were still horny '16-year-olds' that needed anti-testosterone injections. It smacked so much of those early attempts to find a 6-foot stacked Scandinavian blonde actress to play Dana Scully instead of the superlative Gillian Anderson.

In fact, of course, Steen acquitted herself very well as Weir and she was nothing less than perfect as Agent Paula Cassidy in NCIS, Deputy Haiduk in Supernatural, and so forth. But I just never thought she gelled as Weir, which may be why she decided against taking the role.

But when I saw Torri Higginson, I knew they'd got it spot on. She was a perfectly proportioned woman, not a bottle-blonde with endless legs and a cleavage you could ski-down foisted on the show by some idiot 'manager' who thought going for the cheap T&A ratings puller amongst emotionally stunted male viewers was a good idea. (Remember the casting of Jeri Ryan as Seven in _Voyager_ – I grew to like the character, but does anyone believe she was cast for her acting ability or because she was a stacked blonde who could stalk with sinuous grace wearing a skin-tight jumpsuit?)

Torri Higginson's Elizabeth was feminine without being 'girlie', she had dignity and authority without being a ball-breaker and was never anything other than completely believable and top-notch as someone who had all the responsibility of leading the Atlantis Expedition. If Atlantis were real, for instance, I'd pick Weir over Marshall Sumner – and yes – John Sheppard – to be in charge any day. There was also that chemistry between the 'Weir' and 'Sheppard' – just that extra bit of awareness; it made a change from the Alpha Male/Female Underling cliché and was an interesting twist when the male half of the mutual appreciation society was (a) a couple of years younger, (b) the subordinate/junior-ranked character (yes, I know Torri Higginson is actually 2 years younger than Joe Flanigan, it was the maturity and authority she brought to the Elizabeth Weir role, combined with his enthusiastic (occasionally over-so) attitude as John Sheppard that enabled her to convincingly play the part as 3-4 years older than the others)

That's why I wrote this 'resolution' to the character's storyline when Torri Higginson confirmed she would not be reprising her role in Season 5. Considering she had only been confirmed to guest star for _one episode _to boot after being 'downgraded' at the end of Season 3 to recurring in Season 4, her decision is understandable. As a fan, I think she brought _Stargate: Atlantis_ to such a good level in terms of appealing to intelligent, savvy female viewers, but also as a fan…she was given a 5-year contract and asked to move to Vancouver, then found her contract wasn't worth the paper it was written on and seemed to be expected to stand in the corner and accept whatever scraps were thrown.

If it had been me…you don't treat people that disrespectfully and expect them to be there when you want them. It reminds me of J. Michael Straczynski and the way he messed around with poor Claudia Christian to the Season 5 contract of Babylon 5 to the exclusion of all else when it turned out she was only part of the story line for half the episodes anyway.

I know the writers/producers of Stargate: Atlantis tend to be of the XY chromosome variety, but I sincerely hope that network pressures not they themselves were responsible for their treatment of Weir the character and Higginson the actress. I suspect so given the folly of 'killing off' Carson Beckett, also in Season 3 – though they clearly recognised that goof-up almost immediately. – and bringing in Sam Carter; Amanda Tapping was never really given a proper role in the show and the big problem was that Sam Carter immediately rendered Rodney McKay's character superfluous and vice versa – having both in the same show was pointless; there was also no chemistry at all between Carter-Sheppard and Carter-Teyla, not in the way there was between Weir-Sheppard and Weir-Teyla. In fact, half the time it seemed as if the series was writing to an attraction between Weir-Sheppard and the other half Sheppard-Teyla, yet it is obvious that the Teyla-Ronan dynamic is much stronger than the Sheppard-Teyla – it seems to me there was no firm direction given and the writers were just scrambling to produce the Plot of the Week and squeezing in vague overall story arc hints as and when they could.

The main problem with your favourite shows is always the TV network/studio people calling the shots, as these 'suits' never seem to learn their lesson. They always seem to fall into the trap of complacency – which I think happened here; they made the ridiculous decision to cancel SG-1 'because it had had 10 seasons' (Why, that was like killing the golden goose because it had laid its 100th egg?) and go to TV movie to save money, and I think the whole Carson-Weir thing was similarly an attempt to shave costs off the show, which didn't work – Paul McGillion was an outstanding member of the cast and his scenes – particularly with David Hewlett – were pure joy to watch. The WB made the same ghastly mistake when it stabbed Angel Season 5 in the back, and reaped a misery of bad publicity and loss of public goodwill as a result.

I hope Seasons 5 & 6 of SGA are written without any – or too much – interference of this kind. Atlantis has _great_ characters available to it and not just the "leads" – besides Sheppard, McKay, Teyla, Ronan and Zelenka you have Katie Brown, Laura Cadman, Evan Lorne, Lt Parrish, (Kate Heightmeyer, who they again killed off in Season 4 – why?) even that motor-mouth pathologist from Season 1 – Dr Biro – was a joy to watch on-screen – you don't need to keep bringing in 'hot' young women in an attempt to appeal to the lowest common denominator, though I don't for a second think Jewel Staite falls into this category.

But they've brought her character in, and the superb Robert Picardo, as well as resurrecting Carson, so why not start writing for those great characters they've already got? Messing about your actors only results in you losing wonderful cast members of Torri Higginson's high calibre, and you can only lose a couple before you're in deep trouble.

I know the show has hinted at an attraction between Sheppard and Teyla as well as or instead of Sheppard and Weir, and I know my 'resolution' won't be everyone's cup of tea. I just didn't want to leave the character hanging forever in mid-air or see something like what happened in Star Trek: Voyager when, after 6½ seasons of suppressed sizzle between Janeway and Chakotay, the writers for some reason of insanity or stupidity inserted a grand romance, literally out of thin air, between Seven and Chakotay – it was nonsensical and totally implausible. I hope that my story is, even if you don't like it from the relationship POV, vaguely plausible to the nature and personality of the characters.


End file.
